Twilight Of A Shadowed Past
by logan
Summary: Inu&Kag Mir&San etc Kagome's village is annhilated by a daiyoukai known as naraku. she flees west only to be caught by the hanyou son of the inu lord. they find themselves in the midst of youkai political battles and the mounting threat of naraku
1. Default Chapter

Disclaimer! I do not own Inuyasha. Were this not the case, I would be writing this fic on a much nicer computer. Okay, well I am back, and this time I have decided to pull an Inuyasha story out of the hat. I love this series, pure and simple. Now this chapter is pretty much the prologue to the real fic which is in progress now. I wanted to do an alternate universe story, but I hate how so many alternate universe fics just jump in and don't clarify the event or events which diverged the fic from the original timeline. I have labored to plot out a feasible means of getting to the AU. So this fic takes place in the original Inuyasha timeline, the next chapter (which is being edited now ) will be AU.

Okay I also want to warn you, this chapter is angst and stage setting. Also a good deal of Naraku worship. I love a good villain and naraku exceeds every expectation. He's clever as all hell and evil in carnation. bliss So yeah, this chapter is rough, but please, have faith in me not to let angst stand. Okay, to sum all that babbling up, stay with me on this one, the good stuff is coming.

As with my last fic, this was edited by my adored tormentor and resident grammar-gestapo: Stephanie -the all powerful lord of the green marker (apparently green is less abusing to the writer's psyche then a red pen would be.) I've said it before Steph, I would be hopeless without you. You're the distiller which gets decent writing out of my usual literary dribble. I plan to continue abusing your generosity for many, many, many years to come. Hehehe.

In short: you're screwed so get to work on the next chapter! -

okay, well I hope this fic doesn't confuse anybody, it does jump around in its chronology at times. Let me know what you think at: logan91235aol.com

Twilight of a Shadowed Past

by Logan

edited by Stephanie Gonzalez

"Please don't leave me, Kagome..."

The words were broken and fractured through the sobbing as he buried his head in her hair. His weeping came in almost violent seizures as he made the keening noises of a dog alongside the more human sounds of agony. The union was utterly heartbreaking.

His silver hair cascaded down over her chest, obscuring the redness, which pooled across the white of her blouse. Held in his arms, she was like a broken doll of porcelain; beautiful even in destruction. She wanted so badly to talk to him now, knowing all too well that this was their last conversation and that soon she would die. The cruelty struck her as vicious, that she could do nothing for him now, not even tell him once again that she loved him more then anything. Tell him that her life only began when she first saw him there against the ancient tree. It was their last chance to say goodbye and she couldn't make a word.

She hurt, but the physical pain was receding into the numbness of both death and indifference. She wasn't afraid; as she had never before been afraid when he was holding her. Inuyasha would shield her from death itself if he could. He would fight whatever emissary of the underworld would dare claim her. She smiled inwardly with bitter humor. If only he could protect her from this.

She felt Inuyasha tighten his grip around her hand. He was begging her not to do this to him. Begging her not to leave him alone again. He was frantic in his anguish, making mad promises to let her go home whenever she wanted, to be nicer, to indulge Shippo... he was promising her everything he had to give and even more that he didn't, if only she wouldn't die.

The light stung her eyes, yet she looked up to her mourners despite it. Miroku clutched his ruined hand while Sango crushed herself to his robes. Her eyes were glassy with unshed tears; hidden under the mantle of the Taijiya. She was the last of the fabled demon hunters, still was bound to the same code of strength that took root back to the origins of her people. She couldn't cry for Kagome, though she trembled with the effort.

Shippo wailed as he clung to her forearm. There could be no hiding the fact that he was once again orphaned. And through the squeaks and wails of his grief the others could catch the faintest references to "mother". He clung to her with a desperation and panic that was mirrored in Inuyasha.

Such odd thoughts passed in the twilight. She was feeling embarrassed over how high her skirt had ridden up on her thigh, and that everyone was making such bitter fuss over her. If she could still speak to them she would surely apologize for dying on them like this.

Inuyasha kissed her tenderly on her lips, wincing at how cold they had become. He had never really kissed her in front of the others before. The most he would ever do was a quick peck, which Miroku always laughed at, then made note of how virginal he was. He seemed so shy sometimes, embarrassed to show his tender side in front of them. He was too distraught now to even notice that they were there.

Kagome smiled up at him weakly and tried to touch his lip. She couldn't raise her hand all the way to his face. Inuyasha caught it and forced it open. His face flashed with a mad scheme that was quickly acted upon. He slipped something into her hand and then closed her fingers over it. Looking down at her desperately he yelled something at her. She couldn't hear him. Everything sounded so far away now. The same was true for her pain. She was so detached now that she could feel almost nothing of the piercing shaft in her chest.

Her mind wandered even though she willed it to stay with him. Concentrating was hard for some reason. She saw Shippo mewl against her, his little hands on her bare skin. His anguished cries had broken away to a more basic kind of despair. He would recover from this, where as in all likelihood, Inuyasha would not.

Poor Shippo... he was such a baby. She wished that she could have seen him grow up. He would have lived a very long time. So long in fact that he might have actually lived to see her time for himself. But then... that would not be.

There were no youkai in her time. Just the occasional cursed item or ethereal spirit. Flesh and blood youkai had been long gone by the time man started keeping scientific reports of his surroundings. None of which made reference to beings like youkai. Shippo would share the mysterious extinction that would claim his species just as all the other youkai would. Just as Inuyasha would.

Though the pain of her wound had deserted her, she felt a pang of a truer pain at that thought. Her Inuyasha would die. Her gentle lover and fierce protector would die before her world even began.

She would never have told this to him, but she always imagined he would outlive everything else. She took a kind of comfort in the knowledge that long after old age took her, he would still be there. He would still be living somewhere, forever with the same consistency of the sunrise. She was immortal as long as his heart still held a piece of her. When a human dies and all their monuments fall or fade, they cease. No proof would exist that they ever were... but Inuyasha's memory of her would have been eternal. In ten thousand years he would still love her. The idea that he could die added fresh agony to her burden No... Not could die.... he _would_ die. She knew that there were no more youkai in her time... no more hanyou either.

She looked between Inuyasha, Shippo, and then to Kirara who hung by Sango's ankle haggardly. All these youkai loved her, and she loved all of them. And she loved those who were not here. Kouga, Jeninji, Totosai and Myoga. They were all precious to her. They had all enriched her life in the same way many humans had. They would all die before her time. How she wished that this fate could be changed. That youkai would not fade away into mythology.

What a wonderful dream to die with. The fantasy of a fairytale kingdom where Inuyasha and she could live together forever in a land of such precious peoples. She looked up at him and mouthed out the words as best she could. He responded by collapsing against her and echoing the vow they had shared for such a short time. She felt strange. Her body was numb almost all over. She felt the heat of his tears as they ran down her face, but oddly, she also felt warmth in her hand.

The light amazed her. The luminosity of everything. She had heard that people see white light when they die, but never had she heard of rosy light preceding death in such glorious splendor. She felt him tighten against her as he faded against the blushing coral pink light, which pooled in her eyes.

Then, the world disappeared around her.

* * *

Topaz and sapphire faded into their softer shades as the light receded and took on the recognizable forms and shapes of trees swaying against a pastel sky. Wispy clouds moved across the fathomless sky with a lethargy that never failed to enchant Kagome. She could smell the grass and feel the weight of the sunshine on her shoulders as she climbed from the well with an effortlessness born of repetition.

In this time the well was not shielded from nature, but a part of it. She sat on the wooden lip of the well and felt the shifting breeze rake little shoots of flowering grass against her calves. This whole place was thriving in the middle of spring. The air was sweet and tasted of the mingling perfumes of the grass and the buds. She heard the soft sounds of birds singing in the sakura trees which grew naturally here despite the odds that the larger and fuller trees would drown them out.

This was a forest of life. Youkai avoided it since Inuyasha frequently hunted its glades for game, and had exterminated the local predators as part of his continuing truce with the village. These woods which had bore his name since he had been sealed here were considered haunted by the men in the neighboring villages, a cursed place that would be the grave of any who would dare transgress. That always amused Kagome for she could imagine few places safer than these woods.

She had lost her virginity to Inuyasha here. Under the whisper of the creaking trees, on a bed of soft grass she had committed her heart as well as her body to him. Amazing how you can grow up with this perfect little picture of what your great romance will be like, but it falls short. Kagome had never fantasized about being made love to on the ground by a hanyou, and though her moments with Inuyasha were seldom ravishing, they were better then a thousand candles beside a bed of rose petals.

He was still her old Inuyasha, rash and rude to everything and everyone. But she had grown to know him better now that she was privy to the deepest parts of him. He was sad more then she had ever guessed before. He mourned Kikyo constantly, and hated himself for loving Kagome while Kikyo still lived in a manner of speaking. He felt that it was a betrayal to his first love, and though he was unable to avoid happiness with Kagome, he did have bitter moments because of them. His loyalty was epic, and he now was loyal to two.

The greater shock was when she learned why he was so adamant about her not going home whenever he could help it. He was lonely. Kagome had finally learned the truth that when she was gone, he was epically miserable. Just like a puppy, Kagome had thought. Inuyasha now frequently followed her back to her time and waited at her house for her. He still hated it, but it was a little easier on him being surrounded by her scent and her family. They all loved Inuyasha, and made efforts to tolerate him if it would help him endure the loneliness. Whether he agreed or not, he needed people around him.

But oddly enough he had too many people around him in some ways. He was a hanyou, but not a true hanyou if such a thing actually existed anymore. His mother had raised him after his father died, and since his brother would certainly not help, the poor woman had no way of knowing how to raise a youkai as a youkai. He was humanized, and though he occasionally gave into instinct or peppered the occasional sentence with a word like "mate" or "bitch", he was human in most ways.

That made Kagome a little sad since she had wanted to know the other side just as well as the human half. Youkai women were beautiful and strong, fierce in battle and supposedly in love. It was kind of a romantic notion to her, and she had wanted to learn about the other side to her love's culture and heritage. Maybe even take on some of the roles herself. The thought was a little intriguing to her, actually. Would she make a good youkai mate? She loved Inuyasha completely, but she was a little sad that they both had been denied the chance to learn the ways of his ancestry.

"I wouldn't go that way if I were you." Inuyasha teased from overhead. She gave a token jump, but in truth had suspected he was near since leaving the well. He lazily dropped from a tree branch and landed with feline ease on all fours.

"The whole village is frantic about celebrating your anniversary." he righted himself leisurely and stretched.

"You think they wanted it to be a surprise?"

"Naw, the old hag hasn't sworn me to secrecy or anything. It's just that with the way things look over there, they might put you to work for hours."

"I really should help them if they are that busy."

"Keh! They were the ones who decided to honor you with this thing. Let them do the work for it." he shrugged.

"Inuyasha you are such a jerk."

"Like I care. Besides, there are better ways to spend time."

"What?" she asked with an arching of perplexity to her brow. He grinned at her with a single fang peeking from under his lip.

She felt him move around behind her and slip his arms around her chest. Then with a low rumble, he ran the side of his face against her bare throat in an action that could only be classified as a nuzzle, but seemed far more seductive then that. He inhaled as he reached her hair, and she moaned gently. There was something so epically seductive about how he could do this to her. Coax her into anything with wordless gesture. She slipped an arm free of his loose embrace and reached up to stroke the velvety fur of his ear. His moan echoed her own as she allowed him to guide her to the ground and sit amongst the grasses.

She leaned back into him and smiled contentedly as he growled gently at her. Inuyasha was a royal pain sometimes when he was showing off, but in these quiet moments it was so easy for her to see why she loved him so completely.

"I thought you were going to go help them with the preparations?" he offered smugly as she halfheartedly elbowed him in the ribs. He smirked and flicked her nose.

"Someone should keep you under control."

"I've been a good boy." she had nowhere near enough restraint to stop herself from acting on the impulse to reach up and scratch his head.

"Yes, you're a good boy..." his ear pivoted towards her and then flattened as her finger brushed it.

"Keh" he huffed.

Shifting positions, he laid his head on her breast as a child would to a mother, smiling contentedly he growled softly at her. His eyes slipped shut and she felt his taught form relax. She continued her gentle stroking of his ears, smiling as they jumped when she hit a particularly good spot. She continued her treatment of the soft snowy ears for a few more minutes before letting her hand fall to his collarbone, tracing the delineations of muscle and bone. As her hand wandered close to where his head lolled, he leaned into it and tentatively licked her hand.

He rolled so that he was no longer facing the sky, and instead was nestled more closely against her chest. He was listening to her heartbeat. She ran her fingers through his wintery hair and delighted in the soft purring growl. She could feel his breathing grow steady and knew that his eyes had closed. His nose twitched a little and Kagome smiled. He was sampling the air, assuring himself that they were alone here in this perfect place and safe. He smelled like nature himself, a subtle musk mingled with grass and tree sap. The union of scents was earthy and comforting. As the sunshine rained down on her, warming her, she felt as though this were no more then a wonderful dream. And in a way it was just that. She was safe and happy, and for the moment sure that it would last forever.

* * *

Sesshomaru walked through the open field without the slightest fear of anything. His steps were broad and regal upon the crunched shoots of long grass. He seemed out of place in this world, so ethereal that the sight of him is unnerving where in a lesser extent it might be enchanting. Long strands of silver hair lashed freely in his wake as the wind shifted suddenly.

He was followed by his human child Rin, her youkai steed, and his groveling vassal: Jaken. The green imp was chattering noisily, so enveloped in his pointless rantings that he failed to notice his lord's halt. He walked right into the back of Sesshomaru's leg, and in a quick flash of speed was kicked backwards. Jaken had grown stupid as of late, he should know not to touch the person of Sesshomaru. Were he not so amiable, Sesshomaru should have killed him right there for such a stupid transgression.

"I'm sorry my lord!! Please forgive me-"

"Take Rin and get behind me." The icy words sent Jaken rushing to comply just as Aun raised a sharp whinny of alarm. He had caught the scent as well.

They stood too close to a sloping black tree. The branches and trunk were devoid of leaf and life, as though it had been burned. Sesshomaru reached to his sash and touched the hilt of Tokijin, ready for what was to come. This tree had not been here a moment ago.

"Greetings great lord." Naraku bowed from his place on the branch, his pale baboon pelt looking as sinister as ever as he sprawled against the skeletal limbs of the tree.

"You have saved me a deal of trouble, Naraku. I had thought to hunt you across the lands, not find you so ready to come to meet your death. This Sesshomaru thanks you." He seized the tokijin's sheath but paused as Naraku uttered the name of Inuyasha.

"Why do you speak that name to me?" Sesshomaru questioned with an erudite frown.

"Because it is a name of great consequence to both of us. It's a name spoken far too frequently nowadays." Naraku glowered within the obscuring pelt of the baboon. Before you attempt to strike me down, you would benefit from listening to me." His voice was serpentine as he stared expectantly at the elder Inu youkai.

"Explain yourself." He took his hand from the hilt and rested it against the golden ring pommel. He shook his head slightly, casting his hair over his shoulder so he could view the dark figure un-obscured.

"Speak quickly Naraku, I would have your blood on this field soon, regardless of if you have more to say."

"Of course... I've come to you with a proposition: we will kill the hanyou."

"You've wasted my time. Inuyasha shall die soon enough, but not before you. For it is you that have insulted me far more heinously than that whelp" Naraku smirked from the shadows.

"I don't propose this as a means of righting insults. I propose he die for both our sakes."

"You're a fool and a coward. I am not so mindless as to remain oblivious that you are on the verge of defeat. And I will not be subjected to such embarrassment again. Inuyasha in all his pathetic efforts has pushed you to the edge of ruin. If he persists, you will lose all you have managed to amass since your awakening. That is of course, if you live through this meeting." Sesshomaru's lip inched upwards in a wisp of a smile. Naraku glowered hatefully.

"True enough Sesshomaru. Inuyasha has put me into a difficult position. No matter how many foes I send with any number of shards, he always triumphs. I have lost too many shards in this pursuit."

"Your faith in those fragments was always a great weakness. Strength is not found in pieces of red glass. " Sesshomaru shrugged. "You waste my time with such triviality. I fail to see how this applies to me."

"You need his death just as desperately as I do. Don't deceive yourself into thinking that is not so." Naraku rose to his full height on the branch, the off-white pelt fanning out under him like a cloak.

"Do you hear them Sesshomaru? The humans cry out for protection from the youkai. And the youkai cower before a name." Sesshomaru's eyes narrowed in expectance of what was coming next.

"Inuyasha. The great Inu youkai. It's him who saves them. Him who kills them. The weak look to him as a protector while the strong fear his coming. Youkai and humans alike know him." He paused while Sesshomaru's expression darkened ever so slightly.

"Do they call to you anymore Sesshomaru? In your hunt for me, you have forsaken your responsibilities. The western lands would have fallen to lowly youkai were it not for the great Inuyasha who keeps them at bay. The people look at him and see the great Inu youkai reborn. How odd that your father should be mirrored more in the half-breed then in the pure blooded..." Sesshomaru's eyes froze over in bitter coldness.

"You go too far Naraku! Scum like you should not speak of a god in such a manner!"

"I go as far as I chose, and it is you who should know the shame of what has happened. The great lord of the western lands has been cast down by his brother without a battle. He was so weak that a hanyou could steal his great destiny." Naraku saw the rage swirling within Sesshomaru like a leviathan under still water.

"All the more reason to kill you now so that I can go deal with him."

"Fine, kill me if you are able. But will it stop then? For a time it will be known that you were the one who killed the great Naraku. But in time the story will change. It will simply become the dog demon who slew the great evil. And finally, once Inuyasha is gone, his stories shall become intertwined with yours. They will have forgotten your name, and instead it will be Inuyasha who defeated me." Sesshomaru's silence was complete.

"The great Inuyasha who saved the world from the demon Naraku... only to be killed himself by his wicked brother. It shall become a tragic story and forever cast you as the loathsome villain. How poetic..."

"You propose… what?" he asked with a voice so faint that it was little more then a whisper, albeit a whisper heavy with hatred. Naraku smiled.

"That you join with me. That you kill Inuyasha."

"What are you putting at stake for this?"

"Inuyasha has allies of great power. I will set the stage for you and insure that there are no interruptions. When Inuyasha meets you in battle he will be separate from his strengths. No monks with kazanaas... no purifying arrows. They will be quite busy, I assure you of that.

"I have pooled an army of youkai who seek the same ends as we do. All I ask is for you to be their general. I have already contracted another who will act with you. One who seeks the destruction of these seekers of the shards."

"Your military prowess fails to impress me, Naraku. I will not lead an army against Inuyasha and I don't care who you've contracted. Inuyasha shall die by my hand alone, not by your cowardly means."

"Very well great lord, Sesshomaru. We have an amiable agreement?" he smirked.

"I have agreed to nothing."

"You try my patience Sesshomaru."

" I am not blind. You are trying to use me... " Naraku cast the pelt from his face so that his features were clearly visible under the sunlight.

"Of course I am... but who is to say you are not using me as I am using you? Take my offer, and then, once Inuyasha is dead you may resume this foolish quest of yours."

"I have a final term for this pact. I would have you present." Naraku raised an eyebrow in interest.

"No detachment, no puppet, no hiding in the shadows. There can be no bargain if you are unwilling to invest your life as well."

Jaken suddenly broke from his hiding place and ran to Sesshomaru's side. "Please my lord, do not make this bargain with such a lowly creature! He will surely betray you!" He looked up frantically.

"I fear for you my lord! Naraku is an untrustworthy fiend! Surely he has some plan--" he was silenced as Sesshomaru smacked him to the ground.

"How dare you overstep your bounds once again Jaken! Am I your master or a fool?" The imp begged forgiveness while Naraku chuckled low.

"Then it is done. You shall kill the hanyou while I ensure the deaths of all who follow him."

"Yes."

"In four hours you will find Inuyasha in a village to the west. Near that damned girl's well."

"Well?" Sesshomaru questioned.

"Oh? Pay it no mind. You know the tree where he was killed by the shrine maiden so long ago? In that forest he waits for death." Naraku failed to conceal the grim smile as Sesshomaru revealed a degree of ignorance to his enemies. Kagome was a mystery to him where as Naraku had made it a point to know her. The girl who overcame time itself.

Before Sesshomaru could utter another word, Naraku was gone. Things were going perfectly. Sesshomaru was ever the fool, so easy to manipulate. His pride made him the perfect tool with which to work this scheme. But the alliance of one Inu youkai was hardly enough to bring down the fabled hanyou. Were as Sesshomaru was convinced Inuyasha was little more then a whelp, Naraku knew the truth.

He was strong because of his allies. Oddly, it was the humans that gave him the power to become such a force to contend with. The monk who had turned a curse into a weapon. The Taijiya who used grief to fuel her skills as a slayer of youkai. And most of all there was Kagome.

The girl Sesshomaru knew nothing of who by all rights was stronger then Inuyasha himself. Her powers as a Miko grew monolithically during the time that they hunted him. She had already matched Kikyo's former strength and surpassed it. But where as Kikyo could only maintain her power as a Miko through cleansing rituals and the maintenance of purity in every form... Kagome did not. The girl from the future was not pure. Naraku himself had watched her roll on the ground with her hanyou lover only to find that chastity was in no way related to her strength as a Miko. She was the threat beyond threats and thus she was the one that Naraku had to destroy.

He skittered through the tree branches with great stealth. Inuyasha was in this forest and he would be alert to Naraku's scent. Concealing himself had always been a talent for Naraku. Since his dark birth he had discovered a natural propensity for stealth and cunning. It was those skills that he favored above all others they would finally destroy the Miko from the future and her accursed mate.

He paused on a branch to look down over the small clearing which encircled the well. The structure was old and brittle in appearance, but from within the dark opening... there was a power here.

Naraku had witnessed Kagome's departures through this well. She simply jumped in and vanished into a strange blue light. Crossing was difficult if not impossible without a shard of the Shikon jewel. He reached into his hattori and withdrew the fragmented sphere. It had once been much larger, but due to Inuyasha's meddling it had grown small as of late. He laughed softly to himself. It was still enough for what he had in mind though.

With a quick leap from the besetting tree line he was at the lip of the well, peering down into the somewhat more finite depths of the well. Youkai bones littered the bottom, each stripped of all flesh and tissue. They gleamed like daggers in the dimness within. Naraku feared little in this world for there was little he failed to understand. He did not fear Inuyasha because Inuyasha was half the mystery which Kagome was. This well was unknown to him. It cloaked mystery upon mystery. He could very well plunge through into a time where man and youkai had eventually faded into extinction. Kagome used this well frequently; it could conceivably purify him, ending this drama before he could even step upon the stage. The youkai bones didn't bode well...

If this was to be a war, better it be a war of sorrow. He darkened his soul so deeply that no fear could shine through its veil. The world faded into sapphire as he plunged into the well with the jewel clutched in his hand.

* * *

Sesshomaru knelt before Rin and touched his sleeve to her tear soaked cheeks. The child trembled as she stared up at him with eyes that could cut like a fang. She was fragile and innocent, so fleeting by design, and yet in some ways more alive then he would ever be. Sesshomaru ached for her, ached that she was so insistent that he not leave her.

A human. A human child. Had Naraku been so right? How far had the great lord fallen from grace where he now melted at the touch of a little human girl? He could crush her right now, just close his hand over her and destroy her. The thought alone grieved him. The idea that this child's eyes should ever grow dim again. Death should not take her. It had tried once and been slain by Sesshomaru. He would slay it again and again each time it reached for her.

A fool. That is what this human child had made of him. He could revive her again and again with the sword at his side, but he could not kill age so readily. She would live to grow old, wither away until the sword's power would be a curse on her instead of a blessing. If she asked him, could he let her die?

He loved her. There was no secret in that now. He treasured her and adored her light. She was his human child. His petite love. His treasured weakness.

"Why do you have to fight the doggy man?"

"Because he is my enemy."

"But why! What if he bites you!? Rin will be sad if he hurts you again!" She reached out and seized his empty sleeve. She held it in her arms tenderly. Jaken should be made to suffer for this. Rin should not know about how he lost his arm. He would have turned to inflict pain upon the toad, but Rin would not respond well to it now.

"I must Rin. Inuyasha should be taught his place. The place of all hanyou."

"But isn't he your brother?" Jaken needed to die.

"Yes." this situation would have been better were Rin not so knowledgeable as to the particulars. As a child, and a human one, at that, she would not comprehend the duties of a youkai lord. the girl was simple and innocent, she loved him without comprehension, and somehow he knew a depth of great devotion for her, though, by all logic she was a hindrance at best. He growled low in his throat with thoughts of Jaken. his gossip was harmful to Rin, she wept now because his greasy toad lips could not stay closed.

"Is he a bad hanyou?" she looked up to him in perfect trust. She would believe a lie utterly. He didn't lie to her.

"No... "

"Rin doesn't understand." she pouted.

"Rin does not need to understand. Have faith that I know what is right."

"Yes, Sesshomaru." she nodded solemnly. He smiled at her secretly so that jaken couldn't see. She liked his smiles.

"I will be back very soon, Rin." he turned to jaken and gave him a terse command that Rin was to be protected in his absence and that she was not to be told stories. He walked away without looking back, fully aware that Rin was waving to him.

* * *

As the swirling blues and silvers faded away to nothing more then a dim glow, Naraku leapt from the well. It seems that a small shrine has been constructed around the well, locking it in a perpetual shade. He walked hesitantly to the door and slid it open, casting a sharp knife of golden sunlight into the gloom.

The world had changed. Down the sloping hill to his right, Naraku could see massive structures that looked like the gray spires of hundreds of fortresses. Could man build such things? Such great phalanxes of stone?

He allowed his presence to swell outward like an invisible smoke which stretched out and around these structures and their inhabitants. He heard their heartbeats mingling into a sound that only found parallel in rain falling over metal in noisy little impacts. There were so many humans in this time that it was startling. What's more, there was not a single whisper of youkai. He paused on that thought for a moment but suddenly found his thought process blossoming into a new level of inquiry. He once again scanned the psychic ebbs and flows of this citadel of man.

The results brought a wicked glee to him that he hadn't known in quite some time; there were no holy men either. He probed as deeply as his faculties could manage, finding only latent skills in children. The purity of body and spirit required to channel the powers of a regular monk or a Miko was taxing. The strong ones had to purify themselves again and again with ritual, all the while abstaining from the distastefulness of normal human life. There were less then two adults in all the area who maintained some degree of power. The rest had forfeit it to carnal pleasure and immorality of varying degrees... this was most certainly not the Japan he had known... this was an era of defenselessness.

A red carriage swooped around the road's bend; its form was utterly alien. No horse pulled the thing, yet it moved with the smoothness of a snake on the water. Naraku was alone here; he could sense no life from either of the structures surrounding the well house. Pausing for a moment, he debated staying to wait, but oh how much he wanted to explore this world. Naraku was composed of thousands of youkai, and youkai are curious creatures.

Curiosity often yielded great rewards, and thus he drew his cloaking pelt higher upon his shoulders and descended the large stairwell leading to what he could only assume to be some shrine. The streets were amazing and he rather liked the sound his sandals made against them. Another "carriage" passed and he resisted the urge to jump at its passing. It was a means of transportation, no more threatening then a horse. It stopped a few feet away from him and the occupant slid from a portal in the side. The man was large and smelled of a peculiar form of smoke. Naraku approached and lay his hand on the smooth metal form. How wondrous the smiths must be in this time to construct such feats with steel! He knocked his hand against it and marveled at the little dent he formed. It was hammered so thin.

"What the hell are you doing!" The smelly owner seemed only now to notice him, and as he did, he rounded the carriage and loomed in Naraku's face.

"You just put a ding in my car! What's your problem!" He took a moment to look at Naraku, and his anger softened to perplexity. "What the hell are you supposed to--" Naraku had enough of this human's voice. He behaved just as any feudal lord might, rude and obnoxious. He reached over suddenly and touched the man's larynx. The tiny barb he drove through the organ was no wider then a hair, but the second it was embedded in the human's voice box, he began convulsing and making amusing little wheezing noises.

Naraku watched as he groped stupidly at his throat, the fool was actually trying to pull the little needle from himself. In his throes he was stumbling backwards. He staggered into the street and in an amazing spectacle, was hit by one of these amazing "cars." It was reminiscent of watching a child struck by an Oni. The collision was bone-breaking, sending splatters of blood raining upon all those who were close enough. Naraku gave a quick chirp of amusement as the ruined thing was flung from the first car and sent rolling under a second.

A woman screamed and a crowd quickly descended upon the gore. It would seem that people were fascinated by carnage in this time. Naraku liked that thought. He began walking away, invisible before the spectacle. He did like these cars, maybe when this was over he would attempt to operate one.

The city was vast and thrilling, but sadly he lacked the time to explore it all. He was being guided to his destination, stretching out his presence and feeling for the subtle vibrations of the damn girl. But as he passed, he observed. He listened to them talk, learned the gestures and mannerisms as best he could. He also discovered his manner of dress was quite out of place and frequently assumed to be some performer's costume.

He had followed the vague trail of her aura which was only slightly more deeply rooted then some of the others, it lead him several streets and then to a curious structure. There was a great hulking building which would be on par with any feudal castle in size. It was constructed out of tiny little bricks of hardened clay, and surrounded in part by fences made of metal links. Did people of this time have no fear? Such a fence was inadequate for keeping anyone out and would barely be able to keep an aged cow inside. There were no cows inside the corral, but instead humans. They were playing like children, mostly with balls. The real surprise however is that all the females were dressed in the strange attire that Kagome so frequently wore. He was here.

"Umm... may we help you?" He turned to face a young girl who was looking at him with a befuddled expression. She wore the same uniform as Kagome, but looked much younger somehow. This child had never seen death, never known agony. She smiled at Naraku good-naturedly and he returned her grin with a perfect imitation. She blushed back at him.

"Yes... I was wondering. Do you know a girl by the name of Kagome?" He tried very hard to not look sinister. He was looking forward to this part. Her face brightened immediately.

"Oh yeah, she's one of our friends from school!" A second girl approached and put her hand on the first's shoulder.

"Ayumi... you shouldn't just go talking to--" Her face darkened suddenly. Naraku wondered if this girl had some spiritual power, did she sense the truth of what he was?

"You're not that good-for-nothing delinquent boyfriend are you?" Naraku raised an eyebrow.

"This is Eri. She's Yuka. I'm Ayumi." The friendly girl punctuated each name with a gesture to the group members who were now all centered around Naraku. "It's so nice to meet you! Kagome has told us all about you! Well... she's kinda told us all about you."

"I didn't know delinquents wore eyeliner..." Yuka remarked in confusion. Her face blossomed in horror. "Kagome's dating a drag queen!?"

"Yuka!" Eri scolded. Naraku chuckled.

"You must mean Inuyasha..."

"Inuyasha?" all three chorused.

"Who's Inuyasha?" A young man strolled up leisurely. He glanced at Naraku and stiffened slightly.

"Oh he's--"Ayumi frantically jumped in.

"He's Kagome's lover." Naraku remarked casually, watching as all three of them responded as though struck in the face.

"Kagome's lover?"

"Yes, his name is Inuyasha... surely you've been introduced." Naraku smirked.

"No..." Eri remarked softly. Hojo looked as though his heart were breaking into shards much smaller then the jewel's. The girls, however, appeared to mainly feel betrayed by the secrecy that apparently had been going on. The loudest of the three appeared to be cast into despair over failing to stop this thing with Inuyasha. She was clearly against their mating. Naraku sensed the turmoil in the three females, but such was easily overpowered by the boy. This one loved her and now reeled in agonies that thrilled Naraku to his core. He was all too aware of his primitive aspects; he enjoyed the pain of others with the malicious zeal of his Youkai components.

"I'm sure she meant to."

"Who are you?" Hojo asked suddenly, his voice broke. Naraku smiled and bowed regally. "My name is Naraku. I'm an acquaintance of Kagome's."

"Naraku..."

"It's my character's name." He added quickly. They looked at him with a degree of comprehension. "I'm playing a part in a great dramatic tragedy..." He smiled.

"You think that I dress like this for fun?" He motioned to the pelt. The girls laughed a little out of politeness while Hojo did not.

"So what role are you playing, Naraku?" Hojo asked with bitterness.

"The villain." He grinned broadly.

"I'm sure you're very good at it." Hojo replied.

"I have my moments." He paused for effect. "Perhaps you can help me?"

"Help you?"

"Yes. You see my character plays opposite Kagome's and I'm in a bit of a bind." He watched them bend to him with a degree of satisfaction. It was clear that these foolish children loved Kagome. Loved her so deeply that all it took was her name to command them. Even the beautiful young man, who was destroyed in her name, listened intently on how he could help her. That in and of itself was proof of how dangerous this girl was. She won allies too easily, and in this war that could be enough to tip certain scales.

"Kagome's in a play?"

"Oh yes. She's the heroine, and Inuyasha would probably be the hero, though my position somewhat makes me biased against him. He is trying to stop my evil ways..." Naraku laughed with amusement over telling them so much and yet so little.

"That's wonderful! Kagome has the lead!" The cheerful one remarked. She made an effort to brighten the mood; the others failed to respond too epically. Each was still licking their wounds. The humans of this day were sheep fresh for the slaughter, they smelled clean and vaguely floral... not a trace of blood. Their faces were perfectly lovely, smooth with youth and devoid of scar tissue.

"What can we do to help Kagome?" The boy asked, his soft voice a veil of sadness.

"The performance takes place in a few hours and we're in need of actors."

"But how could we possibly learn a role in such a short time?!" One of the girls cried.

"Your parts would be very simple. No dialogue... no movement..." He felt a tremor of excitement as the sweet one spoke.

"But what parts will we play?" He reached out and touched her cheek. She blushed at his delicate touch ran over her childlike face. The others stared as he leaned forward as though he might kiss her. She didn't push away.

"You get to play my victims."

"We don't have time, Souta!" She yelled over the commotion, her voice muffled by cloth. He wanted to make sure his friend Hitome was alright. She wanted to embrace her son, but there was no time for that now. She had to drive, and though her father was also in the car, he was by no means as fast a driver as she. The sports utility was new and it handled well as it swerved through the littered streets. American and Japanese all at once, the SUV was a true testament to a product created through collaboration between nations.

It was stolen from a dead woman.

They were driving down a street of the dead, swerving around the corpses who lay strewn across the street. She had pulled the vehicle's true owner from behind this wheel with a degree of toughness that she wouldn't have imagined herself to possess. The dead woman had fallen on her face with a nauseating thud. She wore a brand name dress and had jewels on her throat. She fell dead to the ground and wasn't even noticed for the panic.

Her poor baby. Her brave little Souta would be scarred from this. She dared a glance into the rearview mirror only to find him quieting down into a bleak stare out the window. He was looking at them. A man was running from a bank, coughing madly. His movements were not entirely the movements of panic; he was having seizures. She sped up and winced as the SUV drove over the leg of one of the dead on the street. She was sure that she would be scarred too after this.

"It's supernatural... " Her father mumbled as he looked out his window at the dead and the dying. He held a towel to his mouth and nose as she did. Little Souta was the only one who wore a full gas mask. They had been lucky to get just one. This all sprang up so quickly that the firemen and paramedics quickly ran out of masks and gas masks. Then they died as the panicked crowd jumped atop them and stole theirs. Rioting would start wherever anyone tried to help, but was limited mainly by the fact that everyone was dying.

"That' enough dad!"

"What else could it be!?" She was silent, so he continued. "It's a curse... The gods are angry..." He began to ramble, all the while maintaining his visual out the window. There were corpses piled atop one another, all horrible and disfigured by what looked like acid. It was becoming more and more rare to see someone dying as opposed to already dead. The car swerved in jerky motions down the littered road while the air inside it became more and more unbearable. It was suffocatingly claustrophobic. There was a general impression of despair among them now, Souta betrayed this with a trembling while his mother's silence grew all the more noticeable. When she did speak, her voice was different. She wondered which was worse, her own silence, or her father's rambling. He proved unwilling to stop muttering about curses and evil spirits, talk which had grown progressively more frightening. Finally she could stand no more.

"There are no gods. And what god would do this?" She snapped at him. Her expression softened as he turned to look at her, his eyes bleak.

"This is a virus outbreak... or maybe a chemical leak." He roused with anger over her explanation.

"It's ancient poison! It's Miasma! And you know it! You are my daughter! You were raised to recognize Jaki when you feel it!" He gripped her shoulder and stared into her beseechingly. She looked forward more intently.

"That's myth. This is reality. These people aren't dying because of some black magic! Can't you quit that for a minute!? Kagome-!" She fell quiet for a moment as she swerved around a dead man.

"Kagome doesn't know about this. She could just come out of the well and..." She shivered with fear for her child. She believed all too keenly that this wasn't what the radio was speculating to them. Something was killing people, killing them by the hundreds. Please, let this be a chemical spill or a terrorist attack because if it isn't, then in all likelihood it crawled out of their very shrine.

There were shelters of course, but nothing seemed to protect them from this nearly invisible killer. The sky was swirling with strange lavender hued clouds that in no way were beautiful.

It started twenty minutes ago and already fatalities were estimated at the hundreds and climbing. People just started dying, the air was acid in their lungs. They choked and smothered, then spasmd and died badly. Some asphyxiated the second they came in contact with it, others died of nervous system failure. Their capillaries ruptured as they died. The corpses left were smeared with blood tears running down their cheeks.

"How can we protect Kagome? We can't even get word to her unless she comes through. By then it would be too late." He reached over and squeezed his daughter's hand.

"We have to seal it."

"But Kagome wouldn't be able to come back!" Souta cried suddenly, his eyes were full of tears behind the glass of the gas mask. He'd been crying for a while now and it sent a javelin of sorrow through her that she hadn't noticed till now.

"It must be done." His grandfather replied quietly as he turned to take Souta's hand.

"How can we do it though?" he asked.

"Your charms won't work. We don't have time to mix concrete or even throw sand in it." She turned onto the adjoining street to their own. "We burn it down." she said suddenly. The old man's eyes widened in horror.

"It's been in our family for-"

"It's the only way. We burn down the well and the well house. The debris will fall into the well and it will cave in on itself. She'll be safe." She wanted to cry and scream all at once. If this worked she would never see her daughter again.

"There's Miss Ijoji." Souta remarked quietly. They looked to his side of the car only to find the woman sprawled across the little fence she had erected around her property. They sped up.

* * *

"Okay, dad! We need gasoline or lamp oil. Anything that can start a big fire." she raced to the piled bags of leaves which had been swept the day before yesterday. They would make good kindling. This shrine was her home, and she was frantically engineering its destruction. The well house would burn, and the flames would inevitably spread out and claim more tinder. Her stomach churned with nausea.

"Mom, Buyo! Let me run in and get him!"

"We don't have time. You should be in the car waiting."

"Please mama!" He was crying again, but this time there was something more behind it. He was not a baby; he had understood their planning in the car as it had driven up the hill, through the fence, and into the shrine. He knew that if this worked, he would never see his sister again. There was desperation in his voice now; he wanted to save the cat because he couldn't save the sister.

"Be quick, Souta. I want to get this done before the wind changes and brings more of that gas towards the shrine. We need to get away from here as fast as possible!" The boy nodded quickly and ran for the house. She cast a quick glance at her brave son as he ran towards the open front door. She turned over another bag of leaves and yelled for her father to hurry.

He ran to her from across the shrine with a half full contained of lamp oil. It wasn't gasoline, but it would have to do. He was going too slowly as he lugged the can. He favored his left leg ever so slightly; his age never seemed this apparent to her before. He was slow, and time was of the essence now. As each second bled into the next, the urgency deepened into both nameless and fathomless dread.

She thought of her husband for an instant. How easy it would be if he were here, then he could be strong instead of her. Now she would have to run back to the storehouse for more lamp oil. Kagome. Kagome was the strong one now, and how she wished that her daughter could be here. She kicked over the last of the bags and prepared to go for more oil. She was broken from her work by a scream from within the house.

* * *

Like tiny jeweled figures the dragonflies skimmed across the open field, snatching up their prey in a beautiful display that looked less like hunting and more like dance. The sun had slowly drifted across the midday sky in a lethargy that seemed almost contagious. The air tasted of the blooming shoots of wild flora clumped together in unabated growth.

Kagome lazily stroked Inuyasha's silver hair while listening to the chirping of hidden birds and cicada. The air was pleasantly warm and filled Kagome completely within. Inuyasha's hair ran smoothly between her fingertips where it once would have knotted and tugged. Grooming him was a pleasure that she frequently coaxed him into indulging. He always snorted and fidgeted, but, with patience, would soon yield against her ministrations. After all these months it was finally beginning to be less of a chore to force him into good grooming habits.

It was unofficially accepted that the only way he would ever willingly be shampooed is if she bathed alongside him and performed the process on him herself. She liked that too; the feel of the lathered shampoo as she massaged it into his scalp. He needed a good shampoo frequently, and his whining about smelling too girly was more cute than annoying.

"Would you like to go do something? This has got to be a pretty dull way of celebrating your birthday." He remarked halfheartedly without making the slightest effort to move from the sunshine. She scratched his jaw line with her nail and giggled as his leg twitched slightly.

"This is fine for now. I like playing with you." He frowned at her and made a dismissive gesture with his hand.

"You sound like the pervert." She reached down and grabbed his butt. He yelped and muttered something low about wanting to borrow Sango's weapon. He reached up and made a playful attempt to swat at her face.

"Touching..." Both Inuyasha and Kagome were on their feet in an instant. Inuyasha stepped to the forefront with his hand already gripping the hilt of the Tetsaigah. Kagome was without bow or arrow, and thus more or less helpless.

The voice was familiar, of course, identifiable with the first syllable. The question, however, was where it had come from. Inuyasha, knowing both his limitations and Kagome's strengths, cast a quick glance in the direction she was poised. She never failed him when it came to bravery. She stood there at his side, ready to fight regardless of her inherent helplessness.

Her eyes were focused in the direction of the well, and soon a figure began to emerge from the silent tree line. He strolled leisurely to them; the ivory pleats of his furry pelt shifting with each slightly swaying step. He was virtually strutting to them with all the manner of a cat, fresh from the kill. In his arms he carried a bundle of cloth.

"Hello, Inuyasha. Hello Kagome." He spoke again, and as before his voice was projected upon them from great distance and seemingly impossible direction. It was as if the trees and grass were all speaking in the unified voice of Naraku.

"What the hell do you want?" Inuyasha snarled through clenched fangs.

"It's a day of some significance. I came to wish Kagome a happy anniversary, and give her her birthday gifts." Kagome stiffened at the casualness with which he mentioned her birthday. Naraku should not know about that, and the manner in which he carried himself was all the more troubling. He looked proud of himself.

"Stay the fuck away from her, bastard." Inuyasha snapped as he prepared to draw the sword. He halted suddenly and muttered something so low that Kagome couldn't hear it. He was staring at Naraku with wide eyes as the figure came to a halt before them.

"Really Inuyasha... you thought I wouldn't know where she goes and how she returns? That little well of yours is quite interesting, but not overly selective. All it takes is a shard." Kagome's horror blossomed suddenly as Naraku nodded to her in acknowledgment of what Inuyasha's sense of smell had already told him.

"You come from a magnificent era, the cars and the buildings. The people..." He paused, tossing the uniforms of Hojo and the girls, one by one at Kagome's feet. "The people of your time are fools. Ignorant to Youkai and as trusting as cattle. They thought so highly of you too..." He wore a sly smile as he leapt out of the arc of Inuyasha's swing. The tetsaigah glowed angrily in his hand while he glowered up to where Naraku perched. Naraku tossed the remaining articles at their feet, making a special show of the one little light blue shirt.

"And this one... He died with 'Inu-niichan' in his mouth."

"Souta!?" Kagome screamed as she rushed to the perfectly intact shirt. She stared down agape with horror at her mother's blouse and her grandfather's watch. Both were perfectly preserved, but reeked of the psychic spores of miasma.

"You killed them. Your persistence with this quest to destroy me killed them. Surely you didn't think that you alone bore the risk? No... No one you loved there was spared. And by the end of today, every last person-" he looked down at Inuyasha with a nod, "-or animal, you've ever cared for will die."

"The only one who's dyin is you!" Inuyasha barked savagely as the tetsaigah separated Naraku's head from his shoulders. The tree upon which he was perched also toppled over, though it's crashing descent seemed far more muted then the thud of Naraku's severed head. The bleeding orb came to a rest on its side, veiled in its own dark hair.

"A puppet?" Inuyasha asked hesitantly, but found Kagome still staring blankly into the cradled fabrics. With a suddenness that surprised him, Kagome flew to her feet and began running in the direction of the well. He too took to the treetops with the pinnacle of his natural speed, finding himself crashing through more branches than he avoided as he quickly overtook Kagome, and then pressed on the remaining distance to the well.

He found the well in perfect condition, but did detect the scent of Naraku from within. he wanted to be back through the well by the time Kagome made it there. Without a second thought to the wisdom of the act, he plunged from the tree line, directly into the well. The topaz lights still shined with the queer spectral radiance as they always had in his past sojourns between the eras, but this time, as he crossed the threshold of time, he emerged into a land of death.

* * *

Kagome was to the clearing near the well just as Inuyasha returned from within it. He looked pale and haunted as he quickly seized the girl by the shoulders and tossed her away from the portal. She landed in a crouch and shot forward, only to be seized by him again and embraced.

"Let me go dammit! I need to-"

"They're dead, Kagome." he whispered gently. His voice broke against her name and splintered further as she stared up at him in grief driven panic. He could see the subtle twitches of her brow as she fought for another way of interpreting what he said.

"Inuyasha! Let me through!" She kicked him sharply in the thigh, trying to break past him. He held fast and gave no sign of registering the pain.

"They're dead, Kagome!" he trembled.

"I have to see!" She struggled against him once more, but found her strength rapidly deserting her.

"You can't. The miasma is so thick... Kagome they're all dead. I didn't think that much miasma was possible." He sank with her to the ground. His head buried itself to her throat in the same canine show of devotion that he always did when he needed to comfort her. "Everyone is dead. There was no sound. And the miasma was so strong that the wind would move it. Japan is empty."

"That's not possible!" she argued, half hearing him at all. Her eyes fixed on the well which loomed behind him; so close! She looked up at him fiercly, then seeing the despair that hung over his ashen face, blanched as fear ripened into realized horror. That wasn't possible, Souta, Mama, Grandpa, everyone from her time couldn't be dead. it wasn't possible! She had never wanted to disbelieve Inuyasha so strongly

"Kagome, Naraku will pay. I swear to you he will! I'll tear him to pieces, I promise you!"

Inuyasha had watched the deaths of countless in his life, some were enemies, and some were friends. He had lost parents and a lover once, but never before had the grief seemed so sharp, or his failure so obvious. Kagome trembled against him, and he almost cried along with her; the same weakness as any human might possess. Kagome's time was no more, and though such a thought seemed utterly impossible, he couldn't doubt it after looking out across a utterly silent skyline. There was so much death that it boggled the mind.

"I want to go home…." she wept against his hair.

"There is no more home." Inuyasha's words rang out bitterly as she stared fixedly into his misery filled eyes the words came back to her again like a sadistic eco inside her empty soul.

'There is no more home." It struck her, sending her reeling, and as her mind swirled with a blurring panorama of anguish, she believed him. Her face nestled into his chest as she sobbed soundlessly. Inuyasha wouldn't say something like that unless. unless it were true. They were all dead, and she could never go home again. Something broke inside her, but she didn't know what it was.

"Kagome... we'll kill him. We'll give him what he deserves. You and I." She looked up at him from his chest. Her eyes were red from tears and probably a mirror for his own: weak, yet on the verge of some unknown.

"You and I will kill Naraku. We'll make the son of a bitch suffer like no one has ever suffered before." It was only now that they became aware of the sounds of hooves. Five riders were racing to the clearing, and as they broke through the bending path, Inuyasha recognized them as men from the village. Miroku rode at the head, his demeanor screamed urgency. He literally jumped from the horse as it came to a halt before them. Almost ready to erupt with his news, he took note of the fact that Kagome was staring past him in the direction of the dead puppet. She looked like a different person.

"What happened!? Are you both alright?"

"Naraku... he's gone too far." Miroku's expression slackened as Inuyasha cast a cursory glance at the well.

"He went to Kagome's time. He killed everyone."

"Oh Buddha..." The monk blanched as he noticed the child's shirt cradled in the crook of Kagome's arms. He looked like he wanted to say something to her, but was at a loss.

"How's that possible? That bastard destroyed everyone in Kagome's time... why not here?" Inuyasha asked as he stood to meet Miroku eye to eye. He looked angrier than anything else now, and that anger was so immense that it could almost make him capable of lashing out at random. Miroku took a step back only to have Inuyasha seize him by the shoulder in a vice grip.

"Kagome's Japan is just as big as ours. There are more people... but what's that to miasma? Why hasn't he just killed everyone here, in this time!?" His words were more like barks and growls than normal language. Miroku thought feverishly for it was obvious that Inuyasha was not going to be patient much longer.

"From what Kagome has told us of her time... there are no Youkai. It makes sense that since there are only the occasional evil spirits there would be less need for monks or mikos." He attempted to look sure of himself.

"And what does that mean?"

"Think about it Inuyasha! There are shrines at every village here. There are many monks and mikos wandering from town to town. They do it because of the Youkai, because there is a threat there. In Kagome's time there are no more Youkai, there is no need for so many shrines and holy men. If Naraku tried that in our time it wouldn't be half as successful. The Reiki that each temple, monk, and Miko give off would buffer such Jaki. It couldn't spread and would dissipate very quickly."

She looked up at him bleakly. "But in my time there's nothing to slow it down. We weren't prepared for something like him..." Miroku bowed his head darkly as she managed a sad smile. "What's happening at the village?"

Miroku bowed his head solemnly, torn between the urgency of the situation and the grief he shared for his friend. Kagome rose up from the ground and took his hand in a squeeze that only trembled briefly. She smiled again, and this time it was more assuring then the last.

"Naraku has moved against the village. Or is about to." Inuyasha's ears rolled back and flattened against his head in accompaniment of a low sound of displeasure.

"It would seem that Naraku planned to attack when you were grieving. That's like him..." The monk flexed his cursed hand absently.

"For all his planning he is such a fool... killing them... he couldn't have done anything to make me want him dead more. If he thought I would be doubled over with grief, he's got a surprise coming." Kagome walked over to Miroku's mare and removed the bow and quiver of arrows from where it was bound. The horse whinnied as the girl withdrew one of the cylindrical weapons in appraisal. The edge was freshly sharpened and cut easily as she let her thumb graze the edge.

Inuyasha's nose quivered faintly as the smell of blood hit the open air. He stared pointedly at her as she let her blood drip upon the arrowheads. Miroku watched with interest as she closed her eyes and muttered. Inuyasha repeated her words since they were far too low to be adequately heard by a human's ears.

"Let the blood of the Tetsaigah mingle with Naraku's as this arrow pierces his black heart."

"A prayer?" Miroku questioned.

"More of a promise." Kagome replied.

"How many Youkai are coming?" Inuyasha reached over and took the mare's bridle in his hand. The horse's breath exploded from its nostrils as it beat its hooves against the ground. He motioned for Miroku to mount his steed.

"There has never been such a force... it's poised at the edge of the forest to the north of the village. They're mostly low Youkai, but a hundred Oni is not a trivial thing. Kaede is organizing the men, but we need Tetsaigah to have a chance against them." He mounted the cinnamon-colored mare and took the bridle from Inuyasha.

"The kazaana is useless... there's a dark cloud of Saimyoushou over the whole procession. This has to be Naraku's last stand. He has them all waiting there even though it's against their nature. He wants us all there when he lets them lose. He wants a bloodbath."

Kagome was about to climb onto Inuyasha's back when the hanyou suddenly shot between them and the tree line. The Tetsaigah roared to life as a great golden ribbon arced horizontally through the trees in a great slicing wave. The steel fang met the shimmering edge with a clang. Inuyasha heaved forward with the sword, changing the direction of the vivisecting whip. He spun around and flung Kagome atop the panicking horse. She clutched Miroku frantically as Inuyasha swatted the horse, sending it bolting away towards the village. The other riders followed suit in a panic as Inuyasha called out that he would be with them as soon as he could.

The trees now crashed all around him as gravity pulled the sliced trunks from their stumps. Birds screamed as animals fled, and at the other side of the newly made clearing was made Sesshomaru looked to Inuyasha with cold indifference. His claw still glowed in the dangerous golds of his unique take on a very old Inu attack. The "whip" was in fact, the single slash of one clawed digit.

"Sesshomaru!!?" Inuyasha howled after him.

"Inuyasha... you will not live to save them from Naraku's wrath, a promise from this Sesshomaru." With a sharp flick of the claw, the whip lashed outward and down at Inuyasha as if it were a golden bolt of lightning. The hanyou slashed upward at the curvilinear beam, once more driving it off target. He dashed forward and over the ruined trees as Sesshomaru projected himself forward and met the hanyou more then half way. The impact sent Inuyasha sailing backwards and landing in a crouch.

"You're with Naraku!?"

"That is trivial" he replied as he withdrew the tokijin from his sash.

"Like hell it is!" he lunged at Sesshomaru, who avoided it with infinitesimal effort.

"Why the fuck would you team up with that bastard?! You fucking hate him just like the rest of us!"

"My hatred for Naraku is little when compared to my hatred of you, little brother." They fell against each other once more, and once more Inuyasha was forced to pull away due to his brother's epic speed. Inuyasha panted faintly as he came to a stop against the bough of a overturned tree. The Tetsaigah hung ready in his hands, but still gleamed in the light where as the tokijin was already laced in crimson. Though Inuyasha knew he was already cut, he couldn't feel the actual location of the superficial wound.

The smell of the blood hit the air in a way that only an Inu might appreciate, the subtle coppery flavor and general saltiness... it mingled with the strong aroma of pine and sap into a concoction that thrilled him in the deepest corner of his heart. He still felt the grief for what Naraku had done, he still worried for his human pack, and he still was nearly frantic over this battle with Sesshomaru, but blood and earth thrilled all the same. He wondered vaguely if Sesshomaru might be feeling this too, for surely a full Youkai's senses were far more adept at tasting the air. He had to physically force his exhilaration back, reminding himself that the longer this went on, the more likely that Kagome would be killed by Naraku's host of Youkai. His Kagome was in peril and his damn brother was playing war.

"Why now? Why fight now!?" He stood more upright as he lowered the Tetsaigah an inch in a show that he was not afraid. "Why fucking fight at all!? You say you're so much better then me, but who's saying otherwise!?" Sesshomaru blinked.

"You'd hafta be insane to think I'm a threat to you! I don't care about the western lands; you can have them! I don't have time to argue about father! If you're so damn high and mighty, then why do you waste all your fucking time on me!?" Sesshomaru frowned.

"Cowardice as well? How dirty your blood must be..."

"Cowardice nothing! I've got people to protect! I've got Naraku to stop! I just don't have time for this rivalry of yours!" Sesshomaru's frown rippled for a moment.

His eyes darkened quickly and he drew back the tokijin in preparation for the next strike. Inuyasha too drew up the Tetsaigah, ready to defend against his brother's next onset.

"Damn you... you use the words our great father might have... no. You are not father!" His words rose so sharply from their normal whisper to a bark that it sounded like thunder. Inuyasha barely had time to jump aside as the tokijin flew from Sesshomaru's hand and buried itself in the tree where the hanyou's head once was. No more then a foot behind the blade, Sesshomaru dashed forward and slashed the hanyou from the sky. Inuyasha rolled quickly away as a mist of green poison splashed against the tree he had collided with mere seconds ago. The bark ignited instantly as Sesshomaru reclaimed the tokijin. The whole act had seemed like a single motion.

The Tetsaigah exploded with yellowish fire that cleaved the sky itself. Sesshomaru evaded with an elegant leap into the sky. He seemingly hung there, staring at Inuyasha with quiet disdain. Inuyasha pressed his claws to his own bleeding chest, then flicked crimson blades at Sesshomaru. Tokijin responded with shards of yuki, overwhelming the blades of blood. Inuyasha was on his feet by the time Sesshomaru landed.

"You would do well to be silent, whelp. Your barking is a misuse of breath that you would be wise to savor. I have paid too heavily for this battle to be dissuaded by the words of a worthless hanyou." He rushed at Inuyasha, set on impaling him atop the tokijin, but was thrown back suddenly. His shoulder stung faintly, and as he looked, he was astounded to find it smeared with the faintest tinge of crimson. The Tetsaigah had landed a small hit. How such a thing was possible was beyond him.

Inuyasha was staring forward at him with a deep frown on his smooth and youthful face. The image was more shocking than the wound.

He was no longer hanyou, but Youkai.

And no longer Inuyasha, but his father.

The fierce light shone in the golden orbs of the young hanyou, a light that existed only in memory now since the great lord of the western lands had died. The image faded quickly, but still burned in Sesshomaru's mind with a renewed heat. It was as if Sesshomaru had peered down into a lily-entangled pond, then for an instant, pushed the vegetation aside, seeing down into the depths.

"What price?" He stared blankly at Inuyasha, further fueling the hanyou's wrath. "What price!?! what did you offer Naraku for this?" inuyasha roared, his eyes gleaming daggers.

Inuyasha's eyes burned like no hanyou, human, or Youkai's ever had. His voice was louder by several notes, but deeper in a way that should not be possible for those vocal chords. Inuyasha whined and snarled, he barked but never took on that terrifying superior timbre.

He didn't ask, he _demanded_.

Though Sesshomaru knew that this half-blooded mongrel was no stronger now then he had been moments ago, he did answer. As the brief reply escaped, he found that he needed to continue. He needed to speak these words as a human might recant their sins upon their deathbed in a pitiful plea for atonement. The parallel nauseated him.

"Jaken...Rin...." Sesshomaru whispered softly before he managed to right himself and regained his poise. Inuyasha stared after him.

"I will not give up this moment Inuyasha... Jaken and my human child were killed for it. I blundered into this covenant with Naraku, and realized too late that Jaken and Rin were helpless." He looked down at the tokijin which vibrated hatefully in his hand.

"When I returned to them, they were dead. One of Naraku's wooden puppets lay atop Rin's face. I took up the Tensaigah, but when I tried to revive them, it burned me." His voice was so soft that a human wouldn't be able to distinguish it from the open air. It was also heartbreakingly defeated. He laughed bitterly to himself.

"Our great father has abandoned me for this union with Naraku. He will no longer allow me use of my inheritance. They are dead, and I cannot resurrect them. My great father has cast me down. I have forfeit all the greatness of my name for this answer. I will have it."

"What answer?" Inuyasha lowered the Tetsaigah. Sesshomaru looked up at him with fierce eyes.

"Why he chose you. Why a creature with only half his blood possesses all of his spirit. I have forfeit my very soul to understand this. Inuyasha, whose blood is dirty, yet has the eyes of a god! I shall understand this! How have you surpassed me and become the true heir to our father!?" Sesshomaru snarled out into the open air.

Never had Inuyasha seen such purity from the lord. Much less heard such emotion. That was it to its core; there was emotion. There were all the same emotions that Inuyasha himself possessed, far more hidden, but just as real. The way Sesshomaru's voice rose in a way which was so inaudible that no mortal could hear it as he spoke the name of his human child. It was the same as when Inuyasha spoke Kagome's name, with a reverence and tenderness that no human could hear. It was love... and that alone convinced Inuyasha to put Kagome from his mind lest he be killed.

Sesshomaru bore his heart, and the fact that he was now letting so much escape was proof that his restraint was cracking. He was looking to Inuyasha now with expectation for whatever the hanyou might say while Inuyasha mutely sized him up. Sesshomaru had never before fought as if the battle truly mattered: he gloated, he provoked, but never had he raised a claw in grief.

Never had he seemed so dangerous.

* * *

The village was a tumult of activity as people darted from house to house, toting spears, swords, and the gardening implements that might serve some aid when the Youkai came. The women and children were being ushered into the larger communal huts towards the back of the village, farther away from the distant army. Kaede, who stood atop a cart shouting orders, organized the men who were capable of fighting into a haphazard formation.

The aged Miko clutched her bow tightly in her fist, using it as a means of directing the men into position. She was an old woman, especially for these times, but she had never seemed so young to Kagome as she and Miroku rode up into the midst of the uproar.

The efforts were well underway as the men heaved up great wooden blockades that had been pieced together from the splintered remains of one of the banquet tables that would have held trays of food in honor of Kagome's celebration. A quick glance around as she dismounted the horse broke her heart. There were great sloping strings of vibrantly colored Maru lanterns. And a little farther into the core of the village there stood a small stage where musicians and dancers would have performed Kabuki. A Sitar lay on its side against the stage, obviously abandoned in favor of a weapon. They had wanted this day to be a celebration of her but now it looked like she was the reason they were going to be annihilated.

Kaede looked down at the girl as she ran up to her, she made a quick gesture for Kagome to climb atop the cart with her.

"Thank Kami that you're safe, child. We feared that Naraku had come for you first. The monk was fast finding you..." she sighed in relief, but then started as she looked around.

"Where is Inuyasha! I had thought the two of you would be together!"

"We were attacked." Miroku replied. "Sesshomaru has joined with Naraku and now Inuyasha is fighting him."

"Such horrible tidings... for us to have even the slightest chance at holding the line, we need Inuyasha at the front line." She directed a young man to pull a wood laden cart into position aside one of the pylons.

"Naraku has rallied every unclean thing in the land against us. Never have I felt such tremendous Jaki..." she shuddered faintly. "Inuyasha is a sign to these people. For years he has protected this village. Without him I fear that they will lose hope."

"Is this all we have? There are less then a hundred..." Miroku questioned as if he were seeing the villagers for the first time.

"This village was one of farmers. Look at them... the armor some of them wear is antique. Many have no armor to wear at all. Many of them are too old, and many too young. We are not a village of warriors as Sango's was, but each man here is willing to fight for his home." Kaede replied.

"Not just every man." Sango replied as she strolled up to them in the coral-laden raiment of a demon slayer. Her mask hung around her neck, but aside from that she was ready for anything. The lethal "Hiraikotsu" was slung over her arm in a manner that didn't impress as comfort. She was holding it higher as a means of making it more visible. The transformed Kirara kept pace at her side, looking very close to epic with her head held high and ears pulled up and erect. It occurred to Kagome immediately that this was done for their benefit. She was mustering all the courage she could for them, assuring them that when that cloud of Youkai broke it would be met by a seasoned warrior. This was the same reason that Kaede had asked her to stand with her atop the cart. Kagome was an icon to these people.

"What do you mean, Sango?"

"That more then just men want to fight for their home." She motioned behind her to where a group of five village women stood with obvious apprehension.

"These women are widowed, they have no men to fight for them. The youngest of them has spent two years without a husband. Two years pulling her own weight in this village. They want to fight too."

"That's ridiculous!" One of the old men in faded armor bellowed. "Men make war and women are put here to make children. Such nonsense." Kagome looked over at him and cast a dark look.

"You are new to this village I take it." Miroku posed, looking as dignified as possible. "I personally believe that a woman would be far more happy tending to a man she loves, but this village does appear to be an exception. Kagome, Sango, and Kaede are all women, would you ask them to go cower in a hut?"

"I thought this village was protected. Where is this pet Youkai of yours?" The retired soldier scoffed, avoiding the question.

"Inuyasha is no one's pet. He's a member of this village." Kaede warned quickly, wincing as Kagome hopped down from the cart.

"I came to this village because it would be safe from all these unholy creatures. Now you say that the domesticated one is seen in the same class as a human?" He faced them with a withered look on his broad face.

"I've seen Youkai... creatures so horrible you wouldn't believe me if I told you about them. I've killed my share, and believe me when I say that if you let one think it's the same caliber as a human, it will become more trouble then its worth. If this Youkai of yours isn't thoroughly broken, it should be put down now." He took a step away and looked out over the hillside and to the enemy beyond.

"This is what tolerating Youkai gets you. Hell, your pet probably is the reason this is happening at all. You'd think that a village with two Miko, one monk, and a Taijiya would know better then to let this Youkai of yours run free." He turned back to find Kagome staring up at him with a very displeasurable expression on her face.

Before the man could react she had turned her back to him and lifted her shirt to her shoulders. Her pale back was laced with shallow and pale scars, claw marks. She dropped her shirt and turned back to him with a deadly expression.

"Inuyasha is not my pet. Inuyasha is my lover and _mate_." She punctuated the Youkai word heavily. "Inuyasha protects this village as well as all the others in the area. If you have the faintest chance at surviving this, it will be because of him."

"You stupid girl. How sickening that someone claiming to be a Miko could let a youkai violate her in such a way. Just look at your back, your scarred from being taken by an animal. Those are not the marks of a lover, they're wounds inflicted by a creature."

"If you doubt my abilities as a Miko, I can demonstrate that I'm just as dangerous as those things that are going to come over that hill soon. Maybe more so." The old man started at her in a kind of silence that was not standoffish or comfortable, but instead more the blinking bewilderment of an animal, stricken with an arrow before it comes to recognize the situation.

This girl --who was little more than a whore to a Youkai-- was standing before him, a full foot shorter and clad in the most ridiculous of garments conceivable, yet something in her expression reminded him of the Youkai he had encountered in his time with the army. She was utterly devoid of intimidation, and in possession of some primal strength that was either holy or demonic in its immensity.

"Child, come back up here with me. The people should see you." Kaede touched her shoulder, drawing her away from the old soldier. The Taijiya stepped forward with her host only to have Kagome smile at them.

"You understand that in all likelihood you will be killed? No one is going to be there looking out for you." The young Miko's voice was soft and measured, gentle in spite of subject. As the women replied with cultivated affirmation, Kagome turned. Her movement was swift and somewhat startled, she looked out desperately across the ramparts of wood and earth. The others tensed along with her as she spoke lowly and with great urgency.

"Take bows, get as high as you can and remember to aim a little high of them. We don't have a lot of arrows to spare, so once you're out, run." As shrill howl echoed across the blackening forest, every man halted their work and stared up in fear to the distant groves.

The woods hung silent and dark before them, sweeping out to either side and bathing what lay beyond in an oppressive darkness. There was no sound in the aftermath of that one shrill howl which lingered and reverberated in countless echoes against the scenery.

"Take positions quickly! They're right ahead of us and to the left! They're going to make a mad charge as soon as their leader gives them the go-ahead! Don't panic!" Kagome's voice exploded against the stillness, breaking them from their stupors and forming them into phalanxes of living shielding.

From the center of the forest he rode, the white fur of his pelt fanning out over his slumped demeanor. He looked like an old man wearing furs for warmth, but the shadows were all wrong on him. He looked more sinister there then if he had worn the full plate-mail of a samurai drenched in the gore of battle. The horse he sat atop neighed frightfully and tore at the ground with its hooves in agitation. It knew the nature of the beast that sat atop it and trembled with a wild and suppressive terror.

The Hanyou Naraku paused there, more sinister in his silence than the whispered noise of the army which lay girdled amongst the trees like a nest of vipers. He looked down the hillside to them, staring through the embankments at the face of Kagome. She didn't flinch from his gaze, but held it with icy resolve. The men most near the young Miko looked upward to her, horrified that she would so readily meet the gaze of such a Youkai. There was a jinx that for one to look into the eyes of a Youkai one would forfeit their soul to that Youkai.

The fact that Kagome was now doing it was both a thing of great horror and awe. She was meeting the eyes of her enemy as though he were a man and not a Youkai. She was pitting her own soul against his. Would lady Kikyo have done the same while she still lived? The old soldier who mere moments ago was ridiculing the girl for her unclean love of Inuyasha now looked at her in a shamed reverence. A Miko who feared no Youkai with all the courage of a man and all the cunning of a woman. Her hand did not tremble as it held the arrow to the bow.

The distant figure raised both his perfectly human hands and made a gesture behind him. He motioned to his army which remained hidden as nothing more obvious then a sense of doom among the darkened canopy. With a swift and minute drop of his hands they were loose and running through the forest. The men cried out suddenly as entire trees were flung skyward in the great forward scramble.

When Youkai mass together they form a veritable sea of slithering and diaphanous forms. Such ethereal radiance might be beautiful were it not for the fact that each terrible, primitive, form was quite visible amongst the glow. They poured from the tree line like the breaking of a dam. Their emergence was destructive as many of the Youkai opted to tear through the trees as opposed to going around them. Though they parted for no stone tree or animal, they gave Naraku considerable space on all sides as they ran howling down the hill.

The humans waited until they were close before the defense took form. Kagome's was the first arrow to fly, and as it kissed the open air it erupted in amethyst flame and nearly tripled in size. Where as most arrows arc downward with gravity, this arrow followed the same horizontal trajectory to conclusion. It also varied from the other arrows because where at best a single arrow could take a single like, one of Kagome's arrows killed dozens as it streaked through the procession as a great purifying bolt of light.

The other arrows rained down on the scattered survivors with a somewhat less lethal effect, but a respectable one none the less. Kaede knocked her own arrow and as it flew, it as well took on a radiance of purity that proved quite lethal to the advancing hordes. Though it reaped a far smaller death toll, it still was grounds to give some Youkai pause in their advance, and as they looked again, Kagome had knocked another arrow, and with it, carved a slice from the charging legions. Those who had given pause at Kaede's blast now turned and attempted a full retreat at Kagome's sunder. They ran back towards the trees, but skidded to a halt the second they caught sight of Naraku who waited patiently at the end of the procession.

There was chaos between both sides.

They had time for a fourth volley just before the Youkai met the first walls. The impact was epic as wood exploded against the quicker of the Youkai hordes. The second they careened with the stockades they were pierced and skewered by naginata and the more primitive farming weapons that were forced to make the transition into spears. Their momentum alone drove the weapons through them in great geysers of reeking blood, but before the weapons could even be cleaved from the twitching forms, more had ran atop their comrades and fallen upon the humans in a hellish butchery with claws fangs, and barbarous cutlery. Youkai blades chopped down through the farmers with horrific ease, rending limb and flesh in a simple downward motion. Swords swung back against the Youkai, slicing them to ribbons with an abundance of energy that told just how early in the battle this scene was. They would all be weary soon enough, and the swords that now met Youkai blade and flesh would feel like raw iron ore in their tired fingers.

The forms of Youkai and men mingled in a maelstrom of chaotic shrieks and clangs. It was impossible to tell the men from the beasts as the ranks had broken and now mingled in bloody paradigms. Kagome barely had time to jump off of the cart as Kagura made her presence known in a series of eviscerating gusts of wind. She hit the ground hard on her shoulder and rolled with the momentum as the cart was sliced to kindling. She managed to just barley catch sight of Kaede doing the same, though on her old bones the feat must have been agony.

Kagome would have made an effort to regroup with the elder Miko, but was quickly cut off by the tide of Youkai who streamed between them like a flooding tributary near a river. She was forced to deal with the more immediate threat first, and thus seized another shaft from the quiver at her side.

"Are you alright Kagome!?" Sango called out from her side. Kagome had lost track of the Taijiya during the battle. Sango heaved the great weapon, her trademark, against a nucleus of Oni which soon found themselves upended in a bloody moment.

"Yeah! Kaede and I were separated though!" she called out as she was nearly bitten in half by a reptilian Youkai. The creature however was ill prepared for what close proximity to Kagome could do to a lower Youkai. Before his fangs met flesh he had caught fire and now howled on the ground amidst the flames.

"Miroku and I were too!" She swiftly pulled her wakizashi from her side and used it to slice out the throat of a nearby Youkai. A large lavender Oni seized her bow tight in his claw and prepared to wrench it from the girl's hand. Kagome, took a page from Inuyasha's guide to dealing with pissy Youkai, and decked an Oni in the jaw. She was quite sure she broke her hand in the effort, but once again her spiritual power made the contact quite lethal to such a primitive creature. She seized the polearm the creature was using and drove the crescent moon shaped blade into the back of another Youkai's neck.

"Where is Inuyasha? We're not going to be able to keep them like this for long." Sango led Kagome to a more secure position where her back would be to a wall as opposed to a churning tide of men and Youkai. Kagome knocked another arrow.

"No clue! But we can't really ask them to wait on him." Another line of Youkai perished in the arrow's wake.

"You're right. But that sword of his would be very useful."

"No argument."

"Happy birthday Kagome."

"Yeah, really," she grimaced as she reached behind her for another arrow.

* * *

It's harder being brave while hiding than you might think it would be. The men who were out there fighting Youkai were brave in one way, but the harder part was what was going on in here. They didn't have to be quiet and still while those who huddled together inside the hut most assuredly did. The quiet inside was equal to the noise outside, oppressive and smothering. Each breath sounded like a trumpet and the shaking couldn't be stopped for anything.

The women were huddled in the farthest corner of the long hut, trembling in the darkness. There were three mothers with babies and now each held their tiny little human to their breast in an effort to keep the child silent. The children who were too old to be quieted by the need to suckle and too young to be aware of the need for hush were pressed in the arms of their mothers and soothed as best they could be. Those who fought the urge to cry out too fiercely were gagged; the act tore the heart of their mother to pieces.

The hut was a basin of darkness, barricaded heavily enough to give most humans trouble, but to a Youkai the fortification of the door was probably a futile effort. In all likelihood the walling in of the door was more to give the occupants inside the impression of defense when in fact any of the Youkai out there would be able to rip the wood from the entryway as easily as pulling cloth aside.

Shippo hunkered by the barred door and peeked through the small gap towards the bottom. The opening would be big enough for him to squeeze through, but there were not likely to be many kitsune sized Youkai descending on the village. He peered out into the battle and shivered at the smells and sounds that flashed through his senses. He could smell blood, of course. Even a human would be able to smell such a distinctive scent when there was this much of it to smell. They might have a little more trouble picking up the smell of sweat or excrement that tinged on the edge of the more deep coppery scent. All heard the sounds, but only the little fox could pick up the smaller noises mingled to the bigger ones. He heard the incessant roaring of the Oni, but also the mewling whimpers of creatures of various species who now lay crippled and dying upon the ground.

He flicked another acorn out through the crack, watching as it flipped away and then exploded into a cloud of smoke which left a various illusion in its wake. The fox magics of trickery were short lived, but at the right time they did prove distracting to the Youkai who snapped or lurched away from one in surprise. This pause usually gave a human enough time to get away or to strike out at them with very unhonorable attacks.

He saw Kagome in the distance; fighting bravely and kicking the tail of whatever Youkai came her way. Sango was right beside her, and Kirara not farther away. Miroku was out of sight, but probably up to his neck in trouble. That or molesting a village girl. A large slithering creature collided with the earth in front of the hut and was promptly impaled by a spear. The poor man who was holding that spear was now being dragged along by his stricken foe who had given up attacking and decided to attempt fleeing. By the time the duo were clear, Kagome and Sango had vanished into the fight.

The snake Youkai tossed the villager back down in front of Shippo and lurched forward to bite him. Shippo tossed an acorn in his face, promptly taking the form of a carbon copy of himself. The fox grabbed the snake by the face and clung as the creature attempted to pull away the nonexistent fox. Before the illusion faded, the man had pulled a bladed weapon from his sash and used it to take the head from the vile creature's neck. It thrashed and gurgled on the ground as the man looked towards Shippo and smiled.

Just as he smiled, he fell forward like a stone. Shippo cried out in shock only to clamp his hands over his mouth, smothering the scream since silence was such an important issue. He assumed that the man had been previously injured, but soon other humans began dropping like bricks.

He caught the first faint wisp of her from the corner of his eye as she walked like a lonely ghost over the battlefield. Her presence was such a void that even though a war was being fought around her, it all seemed impossibly slow and silent in her wake. She held a mirror over her chest and as the reflections of the villagers fell upon it, they slumped in death. She was not much taller then Shippo himself, actually, though her veneer was notably more unnerving.

The child was as much a piece of glass as the pane of mirror she bore before herself. Her hair was only slightly less pigmented then her skin and was utterly and completely devoid of the slightest flush of color. She wore a perfectly white kimono that trailed down to her tiny bare feet. The only real darkness to her was in her eyes, but unlike the common elliptical orbs of the Japanese, Kanna's eyes were as full of life as the twin orbs of a well made doll. She walked amidst the battleground like a lonely specter, swallowing up the souls of the humans as she passed.

If Kagome were seeing this, then she would no doubt see the actual souls as they were wrenched loose of their mortal frames and then drawn into the mirror, but since Shippo, -for all of his power- was blind to the invisible, he saw only the slumping of every human who fell into range of the demonic mirror.

There was a loveliness to the soulless child that did pull at the fledgling desires of Shippo's prepubescent mind. He might have been tempted to play with her were she not so vacuous and the setting not so horrible. She was a child of Naraku, born from his own flesh as well as his own evil. Nothing good could grow from such crop, and thus Shippo easily reminded himself of how wicked she was in her silence. She wasn't a tiny snowflake on the wind, more like a lethal frost.

She turned to the hut and peered inward as though the slats of wood were no more substantial than haze over a forest.

"Hello, Fox." Shippo's blood froze in his veins as he hunkered down in silence, hoping she would take his silence as her own mistake. Maybe she just felt a fleeting wisp of kitsune in the air.

"You don't need to hide. Naraku told me to kill Kagome, Inuyasha, the demon slayer, the monk, and whatever humans I came across. He didn't say anything about killing you." Her words were so quiet and tepid that it sounded as though she were talking in her sleep.

"I'm sorry, but I need to go. I would hide from the others though, they seem to enjoy the killing too much. Not all of us follow Naraku's directions as well as I."

A flash of amethyst light bid her turn.

Kagome's arrow.

"No, don't hurt, Kagome!"

"But I must." She replied without even turning away. Shippo rose to his feet, withdrawing a top from his tiny vest, and then threw it at her feet. The tiny spinning toy erupted in a whoosh of smoke and grew exponentially larger until it was a full head over Kanna. The snowy apparition regarded the warning shot with little interest and turned back to Shippo.

"Illusion magic won't stop what Naraku has commanded. If you insist on fighting me, I will have to take your soul too." Shippo trembled at the idea of having the life pulled from him just as all those men had. She stared through him as he shifted his weight anxiously from one paw to another, looking frantically for some answer. What chance did he have? She was a spawn of Naraku; the first detachment!

The mirror caught the light as it vanished behind a cloud, and as it did, stirred a memory that gave him an idea. He had seen many mirrors, but few struck him as sinister. But all mirrors were just polished glass really.

Before meeting up with that jerk Inuyasha, and making friends with Kagome, Shippo had not been a tamed Youkai. He did what all other foxes so frequently did, caused mischief. Little girls were nice, and Shippo liked them, but they had once been his prey. He liked to steal their ribbons and put bugs in their hair, and he had once--at his worst--broken a little girl's cherished mirror.

It was that memory that sent a tiny shiver of hope through him. Kitsune were natural born tricksters, and this particular kitsune had a Kagome to save. Though he normally would have been bristling his tail in pride by now, he instead hung his head. The mirror girl watched him with nearly limitless patience as he shuffled his feet in mock deliberation, his eyes scanning the ground feverishly.

He found the stone a foot before him, and was on top of it in a sudden stumbling collapse. He cried piteously as his paw clenched over the small rock. Kanna's eyes moved to his paw effortlessly.

"Do you intend to throw that at me?"

"You won't hurt my mom!" The moment that the stone hit the air, it multiplied into hundreds, and then hundreds still. It was really an impressive barrage, and even Kanna seemed ill prepared for such a well-crafted feat of illusionary magic. Her mirror glowed brightly in a reflexive manner as it attempted to deflect the phantom hail.

As each stone proved to be phantasmic, the barrier reflexively fell, but only in time for the tiny kitsune to run over and hurl his entire body at the snowy little girl. Caught off-guard by the hail of stone, she was completely blindsided by the impact of a body that was very close to her own size. She stumbled backwards as Shippo hit the ground with a thud, then with a sudden roar of kitsune rage, Shippo hurled the tiny stone, which had never actually left his paw, into the bare plane of the mirror.

The crack was small, but it spidered outward like laden thin ice on a pond. A fierce light shone behind the glass, and as the mirror shattered, Kanna looked at the fox with the most vivid expression of her preternatural life: shock. Like shooting stars, the souls fled the mirror, streaking across the sky in search of their true vessels. The Oni had probably killed most of their human shells by now, but for some there might be hope. The breaking of the mirror sent Shippo rolling backwards like a leaf in a strong gale.

As the mirror broke and fell away, so as well did Kanna. Her flesh grew translucent then faded to nothing more then the sun-bleached ivory skeleton of a human child. That too was short lived as each bone crumbled away like shards from a mirror. With Kanna dead and Kagome saved, Shippo fainted face first.

* * *

The knife-edge of the foot broke on Inuyasha's cheek, sending him crashing to the ground again. Sesshomaru regained his balance and then kicked him again, this time sending him flying backwards clutching his ribs. The force of these two blows would each have been fatal to even the strongest of mortals. The shot to the head would have been a veritable decapitation while that particularly vicious kick to the chest would most likely have divorced upper from lower torso.

"No, Sesshomaru." Inuyasha's words were hollow and slightly wheezing.

"Damn you, hanyou!" He was atop Inuyasha in a heartbeat, seizing him by the face, and throwing him head first through a rock. A pissed off Sesshomaru was not an enemy Inuyasha enjoyed fighting. The impacts were starting to add up, and Inuyasha felt the blood running down his face, matting his silver hair. He was aware of all the wounds in his body, most prevalent were the broken ribs that now poked his lungs with each breath. Were he a human, his lungs would not heal fast enough to remain intact. Already his ribs were attempting to mend themselves, but each impact or movement defeated the effort.

"Fight back worthless hanyou!"

"No, Sesshomaru. I get it now. I understand." Inuyasha spat blood miserably as he held his tormented sides. "I'm not going to fight you just so you can kill me or so I can kill you. That's stupid. It's worse then something animals would do."

"You are a fool, Inuyasha. Speaking such garbage when you, yourself, are an animal."

"And you're not? You're acting really human right now, brother." He winced as the lashing beam of Sesshomaru's claw cut a gash across his face. The blood flowed down his face like cascading water from a fount. But even now he saw how Sesshomaru wouldn't kill him. That could have taken his head from his shoulders, no doubt, but all he got was a vicious wound.

"See," he gurgled. Sesshomaru was silent. His eyes lowered to stare at the Tetsaigah that lay sheathed at Inuyasha's side.

"You truly will not fight me? You would rather have me kill you?"

"I won't give you what you want. I won't murder my last family just to please some insane honor thing with you. And you won't kill me. If you killed me while I didn't try to fight back you'd lose your only chance at figuring this question of yours out. My death would mean shit to you if I died without trying to fight back." Inuyasha groaned as his ribs popped back into place.

"You are a coward Inuyasha. A worthless hanyou born to a whore of a human."

"You don't believe that, though. If you thought I was just a worthless coward you would have killed me by now. I'm alive because you think I'm more then that," he replied as the last of his wounds scabbed over. "And my mother was the wife of your father. Calling her a whore insults dear ol' dad a lot more then it does me. I hardly remember either of them, so it doesn't really matter what you say, brother." Sesshomaru looked eerily calm.

"You are right. You are the true son of a Youkai god, and the more worthy of the two. You may be a coward; you may be the true lord to the western lands. I now know my place in this drama... I shall be the villain if it answers my question." Inuyasha started slightly as he said that.

"Do you hear the sounds of battle, Inuyasha? Do your pathetic little hanyou ears hear the screaming of both Youkai and men? Mine do. And this vow I now make to you, my dear little brother." Inuyasha felt the fear before the words were even uttered.

"I am leaving this worthless battleground of ours for another. I will go to that little human village and put an end to all the things you once loved. I will end every life you have touched, destroy every soul you have saved. I shall unleash death and suffering without limit on everything you love. Your female, the Miko with the odd kimono who smells of your flesh. I will go to this human and carve out the womb from her body so that your seed will perish before it even really lives.

"That is my final offer to you Inuyasha. If I live, I will kill your mate, and the pup she hides inside her even now. I will purge the world of every memory of the hanyou Inuyasha. My soul is lost already, as dead as my child and my servant... What have I to lose now by bringing agony upon you?"

Inuyasha had never cried over his brother, but as he seized the tattered hilt of the Tetsaigah and felt it transform in his hand, he wanted to wept for what was now inevitable.

Sesshomaru smirked mirthlessly and seized the tokijin by the hilt and charged at the bloodied hanyou. Each footstep like thunder across the heavens. The tokijin rose over Sesshomaru's shoulder in preparation for a downward swing, which would split the hanyou as well as the earth itself. Inuyasha watched each muscle in Sesshomaru's arm tense, watched the nearly invisible hair on his arm rustle in the wind as each fold of fabric bend and turned in such epically slowed motion. Inuyasha had never been able to see Sesshomaru when he was moving at his full speed, but now he looked completely still as the tokijin began its downward arc.

Sesshomaru had never known a being capable of matching his own speed. And when Inuyasha vanished a mere inch away from the tokijin, he couldn't fathom it. A flash of crimson that could have either been fire rat fur or blood flickered before his eyes as he felt the horrifically familiar sensation of having an arm removed. The Tetsaigah had bitten the hand at the wrist, separating the stricken lord from his sword in such blinding speed that it had been invisible to him.

Inuyasha had already flipped behind him as the tokijin embedded itself in the trunk of an overturned tree, the hand still clinging to the hilt, the blood not yet flowing. Inuyasha ran the blade against the backs of Sesshomaru's heels, cutting tendon and muscle in such a way that his legs would now be incapable of holding him.

Sesshomaru didn't even feel the pain as Inuyasha appeared before him once more, just as his crippled legs gave out beneath him, and drove the Tetsaigah through the center of his chest. Inuyasha started at him in that surreal moment with surprise and anguish in his golden eyes. Sesshomaru had witnessed Inuyasha's ascent from lowly hanyou, to the true lord of the western lands in that tragic instant that their eyes locked. It was with grim determination that Inuyasha spoke the final blow, forever ending Sesshomaru's bitter journey through an orphaned life spent in the shadow of the father he would never know.

"Kaze no Kizu"

Destroying and pulverizing, the golden shards of pure yuki tore through his stricken form. It was odd to feel the sudden absence of one's body and then the impact of what little still remains hit the ground in a disconcertingly light thud.

He had been maimed, crippled, impaled, and then torn asunder. That might have been commonly assessed as overkill, but in a small way Sesshomaru found it to be a term of respect from the young Inuyasha. He knew Sesshomaru was such a powerful foe, that no one of these wounds alone might destroy him, thus he would combine them into one devastating union.

And if this was not the case, then what else had Sesshomaru imagined for himself other then total oblivion? He had threatened a superior Youkai's mate and his pup. Such would be an invitation for carnage in any Youkai circle.

Inuyasha dropped the Tetsaigah on the grass and staggered to where Sesshomaru's head had come to lay. The head was shrouded in a veil of silver hair that singed as it grew closer to the point of Kaze no Kizu. He looked surprised that he had won. He clearly had no grasp on the power he possessed.

"And the hanyou Inuyasha triumphs." Sesshomaru spoke. Inuyasha was startled slightly as the severed head of his brother now spoke to him without either lung or breath to really do so.

"This wasn't a victory. I just killed my brother." he remarked quietly.

"You answered the question, Inuyasha. How is it that a hanyou could be the embodiment of our great father? I understand that now. I was a fool to be so blind to it for so long, the Inu... we are creatures of great strength, but our strength pales to our great loyalty. Your strength was your love for the humans. That is what you and father understand, but I did not." Inuyasha didn't seem to care about the answer, just the fact that he was now truly the last of his bloodline.

"I didn't know about the pup. It's going to be born never knowing so much. It will be a hanyou, and I can't teach it anything of our kind. It will never know you, my brother, the great lord of the western lands." Inuyasha paused to debate something, then spoke his thoughts. "I will never know you either."

"The great lord Inuyasha. The hanyou Inuyasha. All I could have taught you of myself would have been poison to you. I was a fool to abandon a brother and to then hate him for surpassing me. I have only regret now." he smiled.

"You were the great lord, Sesshomaru." Inuyasha remarked softly.

"Were I given another chance at this life, I think I would have lived it better. The only joy I have known in it was the love of my child, Rin and the devotion of my servant Jaken." he paused. "And this moment, when my brother defeated me before I had time to further sully my name. Were I given another chance at this life, I think I would have liked to be a brother to you." Inuyasha had never seen a smile so genuine on Sesshomaru's face before.

"Yes... that is the wish of this Sesshomaru."

The great lord Sesshomaru died and his brother, Inuyasha took the Tensaigah and laid it at his side. With no further pause, Inuyasha ran off in the direction of the battle.

* * *

It was a shitty day.

Here he was, surrounded not by thongs of beautiful women with wide hips and ample breasts, but by savagely grotesque Youkai with muscular hips and breasts that he dared not attempt to picture. Some of these Oni were, in fact, female, though not a single one of them made him feel like grabbing their bottom.

He was separated from Kagome, the others, and Sango. He was missing Sango's company on so many levels now that it was purely depression at this point. First and foremost: she was more then useful in situations where you're surrounded by blood lusting Youkai. Here he was, dancing around the battle in a constant effort to keep from getting attacked from behind. Sango would make this battle much easier.

As useful as she was on the battlefield, what drew him to her was not found in the fact that she wore armor, but instead how well she filled out that blessedly tight Taijiya uniform. How perfect a wife she would be, kind and nurturing to the children, but undoubtedly a tiger in the bedchambers.

Perfection in spades.

Oddly enough, she was one of the only women in all the world who he would be willing to remain chaste with. Thank god, however, she had not made that a requisite just yet. They played their game, he would get a little handful of heaven, and she would assist him with atoning for his sinful ways. It was nice, and in a strange way, he did enjoy the pain that followed. It just didn't seem right anymore without that bone-crushing declaration of affection. He wondered about that as he drove his staff through yet another of Naraku's soldiers.

Did Inuyasha enjoy being "sat"? The subject seemed a little inappropriate since Inuyasha was very secretive about his more intimate moments with the young Miko. In fact, all he did elude to was that she was taken, and as such, a groping would be met with a gutting should he happen to get a little too close to Kagome. He sighed miserably as he pressed an ofuda into an insectoid Youkai's throat, burning a gap between head and torso.

Why of all the traveling companions in all of Japan did he end up getting saddled with two gorgeous women and one epically puritanical hanyou? Since Kagome and Sango always bathed together, he couldn't even peek at Sango since Inuyasha felt he might also catch a little too much of Kagome's pleasant silhouette. Sango loved it.

Damn mutt, getting ethical just to spite him it would seem.

Now that was harsh. Inuyasha was among the truest friends Miroku had ever known, and he had a right to be protective over the woman who would someday house his offspring. This was just a shitty day, and somehow fighting endless throngs of demons lead by the one Youkai who had managed to set in motion the extinction of the Miroku line always seemed to put him into a crappy mood.

It was then that Miroku noted a sudden pause in the combat; a small lull that sent him into high alert. He looked upward only to find a dark cloud of Youkai had amassed in the sky overhead. They were reaching their upward arc, and then would plummet downward atop the village in a epically final strike. There might be or might not be a third wave at this point, because once they careened downward it was clear that they would not live to know.

"Oh gods be with us," he muttered gently.

The distant pulse of lavender light gave immediate proof to him that Kagome was behind him by some distance. He could feel her spiritual power quite clearly. Sango, however, was completely invisible to him given her lack of spiritual power. That hurt him far more then any of the battle wounds he had received in this war; here he was; forced to do something so heartbreakingly brave and she wouldn't even be a tingle in his spiritual compass. He sighed miserably as he took his cursed hand, and tossed of the bindings, letting the fathomless dark abyss explode outward in an all-consuming maw.

He had no children even despite all his effort, and here he was preparing to meet the same terrible end that had befallen his father and grandfather before him. The line died today, and the woman Miroku wanted most to die next to, was off fighting in total ignorance of what was about to happen.

The kazaana swallowed the sky itself as Miroku held the vortex facing upward. Feeling nauseated by the lightness of his stomach and the weariness he was only now becoming aware of in his arms. The hole was spreading quickly as it swallowed up half of the second wave, and as it neared three quarters of the advancing foes it had become clear that he was going to die. Never had he consumed so many.

He had fallen to his knees as the last of the wave was plucked from the sky, but the hole was now far too large to be contained by his former measures. He smiled grimly as things were swallowed up around him and thought of Sango and how he would never look upon her elegance again.

This was a very shitty day.

* * *

In the distance a song of agony and death rang out in such beautiful symphonics that it was distracting. A plan's maturation was always a pleasant time, but rarely was it so wondrously choreographed. Each cry into the open air was the sound of an obstacle's destruction. Perhaps one of them would be Kagome's last scream as she perished on an Oni blade.

Wishful thinking.

When someone with Kagome's power dies it is felt. And as of yet, there was no shockwave to signify her soul's untethering. It mattered very little really, the plan wasn't contingent on some Oni getting lucky.

The air's scent was overpowering. The splintered trees perfumed the wind with their pleasantly natural scent in such magnitude that it was nearly choking to a Youkai. Naraku was a creature of many Youkai, and among many Youkai, a good sense of smell was prevalent. It was through this faculty that he caught the scent of Inuyasha and Sesshomaru's blood amidst the overpowering stink of tree sap.

The battle had made a clearing out of what once had been a dense bush, and now sprawled in the very center of the decimated forest there lay the tattered remains of the proud Sesshomaru. The white linen of his hakama now a stagnant coppery black while bits of flesh lay strewn about the grass. The lord's yuki was still quite present, even though he himself was now dead. Normally such a feast of flesh would draw carrion Youkai or animals, but the intensity of his presence would keep the vultures at bay for days until it dissipated.

"The proud fall like the weak, they just seem to do it with more excess." Naraku remarked as he drew up his hand and summoned the eel-like wraith, Shini-dama-chuu.

The ethereal serpents bled from Naraku's upturned wrist and began gathering the lumps of flesh. Kikyo's little pets were not unuseful at times, though dispatched quite easily, they were quite useful when dealing with the dead. In fact, Naraku himself was composed of several such Youkai.

He had once toyed with the idea of taking all of the fallen miko's Shini-dama-chuu into himself and watching her grow still and cold. Such however would not be practical, and though a shadow of her former self, those arrows were a nuisance. Thankfully there were more than enough soul catchers in the wild; he had no need to rob her of her little friends just yet.

From his wrist they flowed, seeking out the tiny fragments of Sesshomaru and arranging them together. Their work was fast and soon the piecemeal lord was piled in a recognizable shape. Naraku motioned for the eels, and like a flock of serpentine birds they shot off to do his bidding. While they were gone he walked up to the tattered carcass and kicked the Tensaigah away.

A sword with a loving soul and enough spiritual power to slay the immaterial demons of the underworld.

How useless such a thing was on such a day. The fang rolled away and came to rest in the laurels of an overturned tree like the trash it was.

Naraku knelt before Sesshomaru and very slowly drove three shards of the jewel into his cold forehead. The tiny fragments slid under the skin easily enough and then glowed faintly. The first of the soul collectors arrived and descended on Sesshomaru, inserting a soul into his chest. Five other souls followed before Naraku took the creatures back into himself.

The marks began to fade, and with a start Sesshomaru lurched upward, eyes wide with bewilderment.

"You've proven yourself to be a failure, Sesshomaru."

"Naraku!" He sliced Naraku down the center with the Tokijin that had never left his hand. The blade cut Naraku as though the Youkai were water, instantly mending as though the sword never passed through him.

"Fool." The shards in Sesshomaru's forehead pulsed brightly, sending the lord down to his knees in agony.

"How dare you pollute this Sesshomaru with your vile jewel!" he roared, but proved unable to pull the pieces out. Each attempt was met with epic agony.

"A dog who would bite the hand of his master should be leashed and muzzled." He opened his hand to Sesshomaru, and the Tokijin leapt from his hand and to Naraku.

"You used the fang of my most loyal child to make your blade. He would obey you against any foe but one. The Tokijin could never strike me." Sesshomaru hissed with pain as he lashed out with his claw, only to have insult and injury combined as the Tokijin sliced the hand with a bolt of its own yuki.

"Too long have you been used by fools, Tokijin." He raised the blade over his head.

"Now, Sesshomaru, witness Tokijin's strength when wielded correctly." The blade bent and twisted, then sprouted outward like branches from a tree. The straight blade now wrenched outward into seven offshoots, each warping into a wicked protrusion. The cold gray steel of the former Tokijin now seemed faintly darker and vaguely radiant. It was a living sword, and like a moth from a chrysalis, it emerged transformed. As the sword finally settled, it was transfigured into a demonic Shichishito sword, gleaming with a faint sheen of miasma.

"You will die today Naraku." Sesshomaru growled, his eyes never leaving the Oni's fang.

"Not by your hand, great lord." Sword still in hand, Naraku's form exploded into a thousand insectoid protrusions, descending upon the resurrected Inu Youkai. As Sesshomaru prepared to fight back, the three shards ignited in his brow in black geysers of flame. And as Sesshomaru was engulfed in epic pain, Naraku seized him.

The light died as the squirming mass of Naraku battled with his prey. The shards maintained their assault as thousands and thousands of serpentine and insectoid protrusions seized and engulfed the Inu Youkai. It was as though Naraku were more an environment then a single being; his components were both land and air, smothering and endless. Sesshomaru clawed and tore at them with all the strength he could manage, with the burning shards in his brow stealing his strength and twisting agony through every tendon and fiber of his ancient flesh.

The human form of Naraku stood there watching as more and more Youkai poured from his chest atop the fallen lord. Now and then, the slithering mass would part enough to see Sesshomaru as he struggled within; there were Youkai inside him now, slithering through his flesh as he pulled and clawed them out. Proud to the end, and though Naraku had little fear of the effort failing, he did have other obligations today. Sesshomaru was a necessary thing in the battle with the Miko and her mutt, and though Naraku's power could dwarf any other Youkai, he was still just a very well managed mass of lower Youkai. Sesshomaru would prove to be his strongest resource, a Youkai lord with all the strength one such as himself could amass in centuries of effort.

Naraku grinned at that idea. Sesshomaru's poisons would greatly augment the miasma; his speed would become Naraku's own... Sesshomaru's strength would finally be blended with Naraku's cunning, and from the two halves a new and more perfect Naraku would arise. Already he could feel the Youkai's presence inside him; already he could feel the changes taking place within each cell within his body. But this battle was tiring and taking far too long. Naraku walked over and drove the Tokijin into the mass and straight down through Sesshomaru's chest.

He was absorbed before the heart stopped beating.

* * *

It was in the distance that she saw him fall back onto his knee and raise his palm up to a swirling sky of Youkai. The telltale backs and violets flared and the pull took hold. The kazaana was chilling in its magnitude, power that even Naraku himself had never made use of in his battles with Inuyasha. Now as Miroku stretched his upturned palm to the advancing tides of malevolence she watched the Youkai around him flee while others froze in their attacks to watch the horrific spectacle as hundred upon hundred of lives were swallowed up into the maelstrom curse. Both Youkai and men ran from the monk as he plucked the Youkai from the sky. Something was amiss here, had the kazaana glowed so radiantly before, had it swallowed so hungrily?

As she realized the full scope of what was happening she learned a familiar kind of horror. A horror that she had already tasted twice. She knew this agony of the spirit when she watched her family fall dead in splashes of blood during the last hunt of the Taijiya. The second taste had been when she watched her innocent and yet corrupt little brother defy his master. Kohaku had been brave in a way so few could ever be, when faced with the task of eliminating Naraku's enemy he had faltered in the best way possible.

She remembered the look that passed over his once vacant expression as he had prepared to kill his last sister, the sudden and subtle tremble of his lip as he dropped his weapon and screamed out "sister!" again and again. He had screamed the word until finally the agony, which was Naraku's will, broke within him and all the memories flooded back through his body as though it were a breaking damn refilling long dried rivers.

She had felt joy when his chanting turned to a rapturous mantra, his freedom pronounced in one single word. But just as he was preparing to run to her, Naraku once more seized him. He lurched forward with his hands on his temples fighting the will. Sango held back, afraid to do anything for fear that it might distract him from his internal battle. And once more he spoke the word, but this time there was no joy in it. Only the grim shadow of knowledge that there was a piece of Naraku inside his mind and that he could push it back, but never be free of the insistent pressure inside his mind.

He smiled weakly to her, withdrawing the wakizashi from his sash. Sango cried out to him, but her cry was not truly a plea for him to stop. And she realized, just as he did, that he was doomed to go mad if made to fight Naraku every second of every day in the battlefield of his own mind. She cried out his name as the tip of the blade pierced his shoulder and cut the jewel from his back. The second the life-giving shard was gone, the life faded from his face and the boy fell unceremoniously to the battlefield, his chain clinking almost musically as it came to rest beside him. This was a victory for Kohaku, that couldn't be denied; he had fought the most epic of Youkai and won. He would not be the instrument of Sango's demise, nor the catalyst that would send her spiraling into a darkness beyond fathom. His bravery and will had thwarted Naraku, yet Sango was still missing her younger brother, and thus her heart wept so intensely that the Hiraikotsu felt impossibly heavy.

And now Miroku lay there on the bent knee of a man pushed beyond all measures of strength and driven onward on will alone. Miroku's face was contorted in both pain and fear; his hand was splitting under the kazaana's pull. He was single-handedly decimating the next wave of the assault, but he was in mortal peril on two fronts. The kazaana was spreading, soon to swallow him, and surrounded by some Youkai who were not as afraid of the void as the others.

Seeing this, Sango charged into battle loudly. Taijiya were silent in their kills, noise alerted Youkai and would draw them into a full frontal attack. Most Youkai were stronger then humans, and often the wisest way to slay one was to be swifter and more cunning, moving in from the sides. This knowledge well in mind, she roared out at them as she dashed along the bloodied ground, her arm already hefting the lethal Youkai bone weapon and then hurling it forward without losing a step. The weapon flew swift and lethal as it tore through eight of the Youkai. Before their vivisected carcasses even hit the ground, she was atop them with sword in hand. She cut the head off an olive green cycloptic brute. They were all aware of her now, but when the first attack was launched, their numbers were already halved. She evaded and ducked by them, butchering them as she went. Her family would have been amazed to see her in such a state, moving with all the grace and poise of a lifetime of conditioning, hacking and severing with a fervor that only a woman in love could muster.

She was protecting the man she treasured more then any other, and let all the gods have mercy upon whatever Youkai or man might dare try to harm him.

Miroku looked over at her with glazed eyes as she cut the stomach of another Youkai, sending it slumping to the ground in the throws of anguished death. The last Youkai fled from either the swirling vortex, which killed legions in seconds, or the mad Taijiya who was massacring as though she herself were a Youkai in the worst of rages. It was as the last of them fled that she collapsed to her knees beside him and yelled into his ear.

"Miroku, stop! Close it before it gets too big!" There was a panic to her voice that softened his expression as he looked at her.

"It's already too large to be closed up. Sango, I want you to leave me now, the kazaana will swallow everything around me into it, and you'll be pulled in too.

"I won't leave you to die here!" They were both yelling now due to the growing roar of the winds.

"I won't abandon you here to die, Miroku."

She had been using his name for a while now, and it touched him to hear her pronounce it with such tenderness every time; so much of this nightmare touched him. He would die fighting, and with his only true partner there to witness his ascent from pervert to martyr.

"I can't die knowing that I would die with you, beloved." She stared at him as he smiled bitterly.

"I can't live knowing that you died without me." She smiled ruefully as she slid up behind him and wrapped her arm around his, helping him stabilize his arm as it tore at all things with a monstrous hunger. There was finality in that smile, and an answer too. He thought back on his father and grandfather before him, both had died alone in monuments of their own making. They had done their duty by siring a son to preserve the line, but where they had succeeded Miroku had failed, and where they had died alone, Miroku would die in the embrace of a woman who was both brave and in love enough to stand beside him and support him as his cursed hand split farther down the middle in an all consuming vortex.

He was content.

* * *

The aged Miko stood readily beside the whirlwinds, which erupted like pillars of livid motion. The sky swirled in turbulence as each traced back to the figure hovering in the sky, suspended by the very winds that flowed from her. She hung there, arms outstretched and embraced by the serpentine coils of swirling wind. The vibrance of her clothing seemed a flock of brilliantly hued birds ensnared and struggling in a web. There was beauty in her form, just as all of Naraku's offspring possessed a beauty that fit to their breed, but like the others, there was a hardness to Kagura's figure. The curves and swells of her obviously female form were all slightly sharper then one might imagine, her high cheekbones cold and unyielding. It was only now, in the midst of this great tumultuous windstorm that she looked at home. But even the sheering and blustering of the wind did not soften the bitter scowl.

Kagura was irate, and making such known quite clearly through her abundant zest for lashing the landscape with her winds. She bobbed up and down as she floated amongst the maelstrom of gales as trees and housing splintered needlessly. Kaede, however, took great care in maintaining her composure as she smacked small pieces of debris away from her with her bowl. The wind was charged with yuki, and as such effaceable with Miko powers.

"How unfair! That bastard sends me to kill a crone!"

"If you hate Naraku so deeply, why serve him?"

"That's none of your business, now shut up and die, once I tear you to pieces I think I can have a little more fun with some of the more virile humans." With a flick of her fan, three blades of wind and yuki hurtled down at Kaede. The old Miko made a gesture to her left with her hand and deflected the three by way of an angled barrier. They sliced harmlessly into empty soil.

"You are quite young, even for a Youkai. You best take this seriously," she remarked sagely.

"Deflect this, hag." Kagura made several sharp slashes with her fan, yielding twelve blades. Kaede performed the same trick, but on the last two had to jump from their path.

"You're not so powerful that you can keep evading me! I am the wind, I'll erode you like a stone."

"My powers are not quite what they once were, unfortunately." She dusted herself off as she rose slowly from the ground, her hand bracing her back. She shambled over to where her bow lay. Yet as soon as Kagura realized that was what she was going for, she hurled a blade intent to cut the weapon in two. The weapon itself leapt from the line off fire and directly to Kaede's open hand.

"Quite the tricky old bit--" She was cut off as a purifying arrow grazed her cheek. She stared blankly at Kaede as the old Miko knocked another arrow.

"My aim is off today," she remarked simply.

In truth, the cataracts were already blurring her vision in her last eye. She was firing not by sight now, but aiming instead for the Youkai presence. Kagura however was so much like the wind that her presence was in constant motion. One of the most important lessons with Youkai was always to maintain an air off nonchalance about the whole affair. When a Youkai senses weakness, they tend to be a little harder to kill. Kagura was a powerful detachment and Kaede had most certainly passed the prime of her power.

It's interesting how the tides of a battle move, the powerful combatants often end up meeting each other in the center of a densely populated field, then as the two begin to do battle, the smaller and weaker Youkai, who once populated the dense battle, spread out and make room for the two. In a human battle, such would be the opposite; many soldiers would converge on one general, cutting him to pieces with sheer numbers as opposed to skill. Kaede was grateful that the Youkai were so primal that their instincts literally forced them to keep a distance from Kagura and herself.

Kagura's winds bit and pulled at Kaede, threatening to uproot her and throw her into whatever debris might be standing in the midst of this now ruined village. It was her own skill with barriers that kept her anchored, but it also limited a great deal of mobility.

In a sudden gust of hurricane force wind, Kagura shot by Kaede and made a swipe with her fan, sharp as a stiletto and with such momentum that it would easily sever a limb. Kaede bent out of the way of the dive-bombing assault, and then fired an arrow after her. Her arrows were being thrown off course by the very whirlwind that Kagura road upon. She fired again as Kagura doubled back to try the guillotine slashing once more. The wind user dodged, and was able to land a blow to the bow in her hand. The wood split as though it were a reed, and fell apart in her hand, a useless item tethered by the still whole bow string. Kagura rose back up into the sky and glowered down at her.

"You are a nuisance I have grown tired of, hag. I'm going to take a lot of pleasure in killing you."

"This is not yet over, child."

"And how is that exactly? You plan to toss those arrows at me by hand?"

"I wonder. Do you know the meaning of my name?" Kagura stared at her, her brow furrowed. The old hag has gone senile.

"You see, Kaede means a type of tree."

"Fascinating." The winds encircled Kaede, eight serpentine cyclones now danced mere feet away from where she stood, prolonging the moment of the kill.

"Kaede: maple tree. You see the wind is an element to respect, but to an old tree who has set its roots deeply, the wind is not a threat. So it is here, you are wild and powerful, but I have deep roots and the patience of all my years. And more importantly, the wisdom of all my years."

"You're delirious, but alright. Be a tree, and watch as I pull you from those deep roots of yours." She made a show of drawing up to strike.

"And it's that wisdom that lets me know that every single one of these winds is connected directly to you." She reached to the leather purse at her side and dumped the white contents into the wind. The purified salt was carried by all the winds in a great swirling ebb. And before Kagura could realize it, the sacred dust was to her.

Contact with the sacred salt was explosively felt as Kagura was assaulted by it. She shrieked sharply, but was all to quickly silenced as the snowy powder ignited into topaz flame upon her. Swirling and spinning she went, careening through the air in wild contortions as her body vanished in spectacular light and nearly silver flame. The winds raged with epic fury for the last instant, then perished, along with their mistress, to the dull stillness that followed her tempest. Kaede bowed her head silently in a quiet prayer for the wind user's spirit, as was the custom.

"Quite the show, brat." Kaede turned to Naraku, who was less then a foot away from her. He wore the same stolen face, and the same baboon pelt, now draped along his shoulders like a monk's shroud, but he was different somehow. His cheeks bore faint stripes of paler flesh that almost could have been scar tissue, but such markings were unique to the Inu Youkai, and it was only after she made that connection that she realized.

Four shimmering shards of the sacred jewel now splayed across his pale forehead, glowing with a particularly great sense of malice, the last four shards were blackened with all the evil he had been able to pool into them over the course of the years. The traces of Inu Youkai were subtle in his appearance, but no doubt were deeply interwoven into the matrix of Youkai who formed his abilities and power. He smiled at her, and she saw the telltale fangs of an Inu Youkai.

"You've killed Inuyasha's brother haven't you?"

"Oh, and what makes you think it wasn't Inuyasha himself who I absorbed?"

"I see the markings of a pure blooded Inu Youkai, also, Inuyasha would have killed you."

"Such faith in the hanyou who murdered your dear sister. What kind of Miko are you to put such Faith in a Youkai? One who is trying to collect the remains of this great jewel and use it to transform himself into a creature like myself... You are misguided."

"It was you who killed Kikyo, and I have faith in Inuyasha. His heart has been healed by Kagome, and should he use the jewel to become a true full-blooded Youkai, I have faith that the creature he would become would be a noble god; nothing as wicked as you, Onigumo." she replied as she lay her arms at her sides. He smiled at the gesture and reached out with his slender fingers, touching her cheek tenderly, then laying his palm on her head.

"I remember you from my past life, you were nothing more then a simple child then, living in the shadow of Kikyo. How you have grown in that time, from the scared little orphan to the mentor of the hanyou Inuyasha and the anomalous Miko from the future. You have come so far, how sad for you to look upon me and know that all this was in vain. The hanyou will die and the Miko shall burn to soot in my miasma. I almost would spare you long enough to see it."

"They will kill you, Naraku." And as she spoke it, she was engulfed in a thick fog of lavender and black miasma which consumed her in a heartbeat. As the dark clouds parted, the pale hand which once had touched the old woman's face, now clutched empty air.

"Bastard!!!" Kagome screamed as she sent an arrow into his chest, still screaming in agony as she let another fly. Naraku laughed despite the pain as he leapt away, plucking the searing arrows from him as he did. His hand and chest smoldered, but it was clear that he had perfected himself for this very confrontation.

Kagome stood there trembling with rage and grief, the crystalline tears running down her dirty cheeks. Such glorious agony and malaise, and hate. Oh the hate was stunning, her powers were so charged that bolts of purifying energy were lashing out at random Youkai, killing them effortlessly. They ran from her now, tearing and clawing over each other to escape the girl whose very presence was death to them. Was there no thing in all the world that could weaken this girl's power? She made love with a vile hanyou on the very floor of the forest. She didn't undergo a single ritual of purification, and now she stood here, charged with divine wrath and seething with a hatred that so few can delve as deeply into, and through all this her power nearly doubled in potency.

The smoldering wounds were great holes in his chest, burning with embers and ash into the dark cavernous body, but even now they mended, the flames died out and the wounds closed. How long it had taken him to adapt this mechanism for processing such formidable spiritual powers. Were he any lesser Youkai, he would be dead by now. But he was Naraku, the great dark cloud which spread across all the lands and swallowed up all that it could use. He was beyond a mere god of Youkai descent; he was an element himself, irreproachable in his omnipotence.

"Such grief for one fallen Miko? Does this new pain dwarf the murders of your mortal family? Kaede was a Miko, a warrior against the likes of me, but your family was killed for no other reason then the fact that they knew and loved you. Were I capable of such feeling, and in your position, I would be more grieved over the deaths of your time."

Again an arrow flew, but this time Naraku smacked it away with a demonstration of Sesshomaru's great speed. The arrow touched the back of his palm for no more then a second, but the power already had stripped his hand of some flesh, leaving it bare bone. It mended quickly.

"You've killed so many people Naraku, so many innocent people. There isn't a hell horrible enough for you." Naraku laughed.

"Send me to hell then, Miko. Send me into the most horrific place you are able, and watch as I swallow it up into myself, growing all the more powerful. You have no power over me; no Miko can purify my evil! The sky will darken with my miasma and there is nothing you could possibly do to stop it."

From his very body he drew the horrible Tokijin, reformed and ablaze with wicked energy. Kagome recognized the sword's black spirit the second it was cleaved from the bubbling flesh. Naraku held it in his hand appraisingly, watching as his own flesh and blood slithered down the blade and back to his hand where it merged back into the mother mass like two beads of liquid mercury rejoining to one.

"You killed Sesshomaru?"

"No. His brother murdered him. I used Inuyasha and Sesshomaru to my own ends. The stupid lord will fight his brother for pride, and with the right incentive, make the battle to the death. Inuyasha will kill his brother, for the mutt can only die by my hands. A dead Sesshomaru, resurrected by the black shards of the jewel, would be no trouble for this Naraku to consume. Inuyasha is my pawn, my most loyal and stupid slave." He looked to his side just as the golden bolts of yuki tore him into pieces. The scattered remains fell with wet noise to the ground, splattering a tar-like fluid, which must serve as blood in Naraku's horrific body.

Inuyasha stood in the distance, the Tetsaigah radiating with golden flame. Kagome ran to him, but stopped and turned suddenly as she felt a sudden spike in Naraku's heavily masked presence. The black blood trickled upward and over the fragmented hunks of flesh, covering each in a shimmering black lacquer. As liquid tendrils, the goo reformed as Naraku, clad in his pelt. He laughed gaily as he threw back his hair and pelt from his face.

"Welcome Inuyasha. I've been waiting. Kagome and I have been chatting about how you delivered your brother to me, thank you for that." He paused then started suddenly with a beaming grin. "You do smell Kaede, correct her singed flesh and sizzling fat? She died so short a time ago that if you used that speed which you used to kill Sesshomaru, you might have saved her. Too bad you're so new to it, you'd need to practice quite a bit before you could do this!" In an instant, Naraku had bridged the distance and driven the Tokijin through Inuyasha's stomach, then hurled him away with a great swing. The blood splattered hanyou collided with a hut, sending the dwelling teetering from its stilt legs and crumbling to the earth.

Kagome cried out as Inuyasha rose up and cut the wind with his sword. The ribbons of obliterating energy raced along the ground until they met Naraku and Tokijin with a great clang. The Shichishito swung against the Kaze-no-Kizu and deflected the blast to his side.

"Sesshomaru had no idea how to use his own power, never have I felt such strength at my command." He leaned back as a purifying arrow shot through the open air where once his head had been. The heat from the arrow sizzled his face and ignited his hair for the seconds until it was healed.

"Ah, perhaps Kagome would like to feel the same miasma which melted her family and mentor?"

He was upon her in a heartbeat. Inuyasha cried out and rocketed for him with the same speed he had used to dismantle Sesshomaru, but Naraku was clearly more in control of Sesshomaru's speed then even the western lord had once been. His hand was already outstretched when much to both Youkai's surprise, Kagome had lunged forward at him, plunging an arrow into his eye. Naraku screamed as the purifying weapon ignited his face like a bonfire, Inuyasha was to him in a moment and with a great sweeping slice from Tetsaigah, beheaded him and sent the flaming ball of bone hair and flesh rolling across the ground.

The body of Naraku vanished in a flash of sulphurous smoke, only to reappear atop the head, reclaim it, and rip the arrow from the hollow charcoaled socket. The flesh mended and finally, the jellied eye formed within the cavernous hollow, knitting itself into his brain and restoring the orbs vision.

"You bastard, come on and show me how you use that thing!" Inuyasha propelled himself forward, the Tetsaigah hitting so hard that Naraku staggered backwards. Naraku was not a natural born fighter, but possessed enough Youkai to make up the difference. Sesshomaru's natural skill was also at Naraku's disposal, but it was still close enough for Inuyasha to push his experience and send Naraku into a defensive position. Again and again the Tetsaigah clanged against the Tokijin, Naraku, still not fully healed from Kagome's horrific attack was staggering backwards, parrying each swipe, but not making too much ground himself.

Such began to look hopeful as Inuyasha ducked to the side, watching in awe as three purifying arrows flew over his shoulder and buried themselves in his chest and throat. Tetsaigah split him halfway down his middle.

Drawing in on himself and with a sudden pulse of his yuki, he sent each sacred arrow flying out of him. The still split Youkai flung himself at Inuyasha, and used the Tokijin to send him hurtling away in a swirling fount of blood. Inuyasha landed in a crouch just in time to pounce forward as Naraku descended from the air and drove the sword into the ground where Inuyasha had been no more then a moment ago. Tetsaigah slashed at Naraku's back with limited satisfaction, and the dance resumed. Every opportunity Kagome got, she planted a number of arrows into Naraku, only to have them expelled in what had to be an agonizing act.

"You can't defeat me hanyou. You and your whore are nothing to me." With a flash of epic speed, Inuyasha sent Naraku flying backwards, bleeding from his throat. He landed in a perfect crouch; pelt fanning out behind him like regal robes.

"Come on you fucker! I'm going to end this once and for all!" Both combatants propelled themselves forward with inconceivable speed, both driving their sword through the other's chest.

* * *

Miroku watched as the swirling dervish of blacks and violets mingled with silvers and azures, swirling together in a tumultuous kind of beauty that was as lethal as it was breathtaking. Already he could feel the pull turning back on him, gentle, yet insistent, but rapidly increasing.

Sango clung to him, her arm wrapped across his chest and lost in the fluttering folds of his robes, her other hand remained laced to his own, holding it upward so as not to kill any unfortunate bystander who might wander too close. Miroku felt Sango's hair as it lashed his cheek in the wind, sweet stinging little lashes that he savored almost as deeply as the feel of her warmth molded to his back. The vacuous pull made scent impossible for him, but he savored the memory of Sango's fragrance. Her head was tucked on his shoulder, but her eyes were to their joined hands, watching the beauty of the kazaana as it pulled the clouds from the sky and into itself.

The pull increased and began that last horrific moment that Miroku had thought of so frequently in his morbid youth. He knew he was going to die from childhood, and he knew how as well. He had seen the great domed craters on Mushin's land, seen the final scar left by the cursed hand. How many macabre nights had he lain there on his mat staring up at the ceiling, wondering what it must have been like. The agony of being bent and pulled into your own hand. He had imagined it being excruciating, and as the pull reached the point of self-consumption, he knew it would be.

Sango felt the trembling as he took his good hand and laced it around hers, pulling it away from the cursed void. She almost fought him, but seemed to mellow as he took her hand and squeezed it tightly. She knew that the moment had come.

Like a nightmare it happened, his fingers bending and twisting forwards, the tiny phalanges snapping and coming unjointed all within his stretched skin he pulled back against the pull, but found that it was impossible, his hand was crushing itself and being pulled towards the vacuous threshold. He cried out in pain as Sango crushed herself to him, expertly unsheathing her sword as she did.

* * *

Kagome screamed out in shock as both Naraku and Inuyasha staggered in the horrifying embrace, bloodied points sticking out either of their backs. Inuyasha leaned forward so that his face was almost touching Naraku's.

"It seems like this is a fight between hanyou, eh?"

"Don't compare me to something as flawed as you. This will end now!" He made a gesture as though he were going to explode with miasma, yet halted as Inuyasha drove his claws into Naraku's chest, grabbing him by the collar bone and pulling him so close that their foreheads touched.

"You know what makes my Tetsaigah stronger then the Tokijin? It's able to get tougher with everything it kills."

"Oh?" Naraku hissed as he drove Tokijin deeper, much to Inuyasha's agony.

"Yeah," he replied through gritted teeth, "When it drank the blood of that damn worm, Ryukotsusei... it became able to do the Kaze-no-Kizu whenever I wanted and learned the Bakuryuuha. It drank the blood of those bat Youkai and was able to chop through barriers... and now it's in you." He heaved upward so that the entire blade now shimmered with Naraku's blood. The black blood sunk into the blade as though it were water on a sponge.

"You may have gotten really tough, but I bet that if my sword drains you a bit, you'll be taken down a few notches." He tightened his grip on the stunned Youkai's collarbone.

And whispered into his ear:

"This is for everyone you've used and destroyed, bastard." He smiled even as blood ran down his lips.

"And remember, a hanyou was the one who killed you..."

Using the collarbone for leverage, Inuyasha tore Naraku upward and off his sword, tossing the stricken Youkai high into the air. He turned and yelled to Kagome as he drew up the Tetsaigah. The arrow was leaving the bow even as he spoke her name.

The Bakuryuuha was normally a backlash of a Youkai's own power, but in truth, the attack drew whatever power it came in contact with into itself. As it mingled with Kagome's arrow, it joined with it in a way that poets might have fun putting to verse. Youkai power and Miko energy mingled and transformed the attack into a blast of crimson and silver which streaked across the sky like a bolt of celestial flame. It hit Naraku full force and in that magnificent moment split the heavens with a radiance that blinded both the eyes and the soul. The shadow Naraku perished under such intense light, leaving nothing more then a snowfall of shimmering embers.

* * *

The sky exploded with such light that Sango dropped the sword and shielded her eyes. Never had she felt such power. As a human with no spiritual power of her own, the blast should have been nothing more to her then a strobe of intense radiance, but it was more then that. As the sky ignited in rosy flame, she felt the impact as though it were a collision. Miroku too managed to look up in spite of the pain, muttering something that Sango couldn't quite hear, but suspected to be a prayer.

And apparently the prayer went answered; the winds faded and then died away to nothing more then a faint whisper of a breeze. Sango and Miroku fell backwards suddenly. Sango grabbed Miroku's wrist, wincing at the damage that would leave him crippled forever in the hand. But sure enough, beneath the claw of broken fingers and malformed palm, the black elliptical portal was mending itself with flash, closing over as though it were a wound healed without scarring. Miroku clutched the broken thing at his wrist, rolling on his side with agony, yet his weeping was now tears of joy. He cried out praises to Buddha but most heavily to Inuyasha and Kagome, for it was clear that the only thing this could mean was that Naraku was dead, and they had been his murderers.

Sango crushed him in an embrace, rolling on the ground like children lost to rapture. She laid kisses upon his lips and vows of love that went muddled as they were spoken into his tear soaked robe. Miroku had lost a hand, but gained a future.

* * *

Inuyasha fell to his knees and wrenched the Tokijin from his chest, tossing the wicked blade away from him. The hateful steel clanged softly as it scraped across the ground. Like a rainstorm of shimmering embers from a fire the little sparks of blazing soot floated downward lazily on the breeze. Naraku was dead, dead, gone, and scattered to the winds, never to return. The Tetsaigah was resonating strangely, and as Inuyasha looked down over the blade, he found it shimmering with a kind of purplish black light.

The sword was responding to the presence of Youkai, swirling in the air in a chaotic frenzy now that Naraku was dead and no force remained to control them. Kagome must have noticed too, because she let out a sharp cry of warning to Inuyasha, unaware that Tetsaigah had learned some new tricks now that it had drank Naraku's own formidable blood. He could sense the shikon shards that lay very near to them, ripped from Naraku's own brow by that shocking variation of the Bakuryuuha.

He sniffed the blade, wincing as he detected a faint sulphurous hint of miasma. "Oie, Tetsaigah, you drank a little too much of that, bastard," he remarked as he lazily rose to his feet, feeling certain that his sword's pulsing was a whisper of something new.

He drew back on the sword, resting it beside his ankle and taking it in both hands. With a great upward slash -the blade which flared red when breaking a barrier- glowed onyx. From the curved blade a new attack most certainly did erupt, swirling and gaseous, but still reminiscent of the Kaze-no-Kizu.

The last of Naraku's army was dissolved instantly in the bitter wind of the black miasma Inuyasha's own sword had created. He watched in awe and discomfort as the Youkai rained down as little smoldering fragments of bone and gristle. He looked down, a little frightened by the sword using such a distinctly Naraku-like skill. He was grateful, however, when the black faded away back to the normal steely coloration. He would have to have Kagome and Miroku look it over to make sure that this new ability to sense shards and generate miasma was not something Naraku himself might approve of. He'd seen far too many cursed weapons in his travels to accept this new endowment to the Tetsaigah without concern.

Slipping the sword back into its sheath, Inuyasha turned towards the remains of the majority of the village, it was a ruin of what it once was, now little more then lopsided structures, rubble, about two hundred tons of corpse-meat. The surviving villagers were peeking staring at the sky, still smoldering in the spot where Naraku was killed, others were beginning the arduous task of digging out survivors and the wounded from the rubble. He saw Miroku and Sango shambling over the hill, Miroku leaning on Sango's shoulder. He felt an odd aura to the southern end of the village that he knew almost intrinsically to be Kirara. The fox brat was also around, though the Tetsaigah could sense him less due to his low yuki.

He looked over at Kagome, smelling the sweat running down her back, nearly reducing him to swooning. Her scent was far better then the ability to sense her aura, he didn't care that Tetsaigah could find her by her spiritual power; her scent was so much nicer. He broke into a smile as she broke into a run to him, all the while screaming, "We did it! We won!" Sentiments that he was trembling with down to the pit of his stomach.

Naraku was dead; the jewel was theirs! They had finally beaten the bastard, and she was his! She was already carrying his pup! Soon he would be able to smell the change too, just like Sesshomaru had.

He abandoned the idea of waiting for her to reach him; bravado was nothing to tasting her now, to smelling that scent just a little more clearly. He was three bounds towards her when he sputtered to a stop, his eyes widening as her chest exploded in a splash of blood right to the left of her heart. The arrowhead gleaming red as Kagome's white shirt soon came to mimic.

The arrow was already poking through her chest as she faltered in her step, stumbling briefly and then standing there in a daze. She looked over at Inuyasha questioningly as to his horrified expression, wondering what the sudden wrongness in her chest had to do with the sheer terror that passed through her lover and friends as they barreled down the hill.

Kagome fell down in a heap, coming to rest on her side. Inuyasha stared up blankly at Kikyo, who stood in the distance, her bow held aloft, string vibrating. Her expression was as always, a mask of such aloofness that it appeared to be incapable of movement. She was cold and icy as she stood there, slowly drawing down her bow, taking the gradual strides forward, towards the paralyzed hanyou. Her skin shone in the dappled panorama of light and shadow like pale china. She glanced superiorly downward upon the three mourners who had fallen around Kagome clutching her desperately. Sango glared up at her with murder in her eyes as she passed, the fox Youkai wept.

Kagome was still sputtering broken words as Kikyo met Inuyasha where he stood transfixed by the pale Miko. She smiled mournfully to him.

"You've killed that villain Naraku, as I knew you must." The flowing rivers of her ebony hair swept from her face as she tossed the bow to the soft grass underfoot.

"I made the alliance with that villain, because I knew that with me at his side he would surely fall victim to overconfidence. He was, after all, a foolish scoundrel."

"Why have you done this Kikyo? I thought you wanted me dead... not Kagome."

"My poor beloved Inuyasha, I have outgrown that hateful ambition. There can only be one of us in this time, and I have chosen to live. I will take back my soul as it leaves that body, I will be restored and we can be--"

"Doesn't it matter that Kagome will die to you! You shot her! You're a fucking Miko!" Inuyasha screamed in exasperation. She remained undaunted and reached to stroke his face.

"No, it doesn't matter. In the wheel of time such is a small matter. Kikyo or Kagome, all that matters is that there must be one in this time. And I was here first." He shook her hand from his face and raised his claw menacingly at her.

"How could you! I love her! She's my mate and you killed her! How could you think that I would just forgive you for that!" She smirked sharply.

"And what will you do Inuyasha? Kill me with your own claws? You loved her? You loved me as well. I was the one who saw something human in a hanyou; you can never forget that. I will forgive your disloyalty to me; you are flesh and also tempted by certain savage parts of your nature."

"What did I ever see in you?" he remarked darkly, pain laden through his voice.

"Tell me Inuyasha, answer me honestly. When you laid with her in that little fur-laden den of yours, when you rolled with her on the grass like two animals in heat, when you whispered vows of love in her ear... did you ever once not love me? Or was there always a part of you that longed for me?" He was quiet as he stared at her, aware that Sango Miroku and Shippo were watching him in grim speculation. They physically lurched in horror as he reached over and kissed her.

"I always loved you," he remarked sadly as he pulled away. "But that part of me is dead now." His voice turned to ice as he drove his clawed hand through her stomach, meeting her stunned gaze with his menacing eyes.

"Dead and buried"

With a sharp snap of his arm the others blanched in horror as the two halves of Kikyo fell to the grassy floor. The Miko, who was at heart a Golem of clay and grave soil, splintered and fell as though she were of no more consequence than an upended clay statue. She sputtered on the ground, her fingers clawing piteously at the soil which was, ironically, not too different from she herself.

Inuyasha walked away from her with slow and measured steps, not even flinching as she sputtered his name. She was not evil, just misguided and corrupted by this half-life. How broken she had become... by shooting Kagome, killing her, Kikyo had proven herself to be little more then a wicked shell of the woman she once was. She had thought life was inconsequential. Kagome or Kikyo, it didn't matter which, just so long as there was one left.

"Inuyasha... Kikyo is still alive, should I finish her so she passes peacefully?" Miroku offered.

"No, let her live. I don't care that she's suffering; I don't want her going in peace. Not after this." he muttered venomously.

Inuyasha fell to his knees before Kagome, taking her gently into his lap where he cradled her head and shoulders. Sango had flung herself into Miroku's arms, crushing herself against him, she trembled in quiet wracking dry sobs as he tried--with all the strength of his being--to console her in her grief. Shippo was sobbing bitterly against her, careful to avoid the arrow.

Inuyasha spoke to her desperately, feeling all the restraint he had used when walking away from Kikyo crack and splinter away to sand.

"Please don't die Kagome..." he begged her, gently touching her face.

She made the gasping fish noises that one makes when their lung is punctured and deflating. She was dying, and in the bleakest part of Inuyasha's mind he could not deny that. She tried talking only to burble at him in incomprehensible sounds. Inuyasha's heart broke and he noticed, for the first time, that he was crying.

As the tears rolled down his cheeks, alien and frightening to him, he broke down on her. He began babbling madly about how she couldn't die. How much he needed her. He made promise after promise about giving her everything she had ever wanted, being nice and letting her go home more. He was only half aware that she no longer had a home to go to, but still he promised it.

He lost track of all time as he sat there before her, talking to her and touching her as everyone cried over her. The entire village was there, and through a quick sonar-like pulse by the Tetsaigah he was sure that even some of the dead villagers were there watching over her miserably. She was so loved...

The Tetsaigah pulsed again, flashing a quick glimpse of the souls of the departed, but also the shards of the jewel Naraku had died with. The fragments lay on the ground glittering.

Inuyasha's eyes widened suddenly as he turned to Kirara and with a canine noise that he knew she would understand sent her scampering off to collect the three remaining pieces.

No sooner had he gently removed their jewel shards then she returned. The tiny glowing orb glittered in his hand, and as he carefully dropped the last three shards into the craterous gouge in the otherwise perfect sphere, the jewel mended itself back into wholeness. Even to hanyou eyes it was impossible to see where the fragments had come together.

He took Kagome's cooling hand and slid the jewel into her palm.

"It's okay Kagome! It'll work! Wish to live! If you wish it, the jewel will save your life!" he yelled into her ear, frantic now, as her face had grown ashen with blood loss. He screamed again.

"WISH DAMMIT!" Her cloudy eyes looked at him sleepily and grew fixed. Kikyo hissed his name from where she lay, less a word and more a vocalization of hatred. He was faintly aware of the panic that was washing through him with exponential jumps, as Kagome looked more and more dead. But just as he was at his darkest, he noticed the jewel flicker into life.

At first the jewel did little more then glow gently, but within moments it was hard to see the shimmering edges for all the light. Sango and Miroku made sounds of shock while Shippo's wails abruptly stopped. Inuyasha was praying to gods he had heard of and some he hadn't. Brighter and brighter the light grew, engulfing Kagome in a rosy bloom of flittering light.

Kikyo made another indistinguishable sound of anger, but was not noticed for the fact that the jewel's light was pulsing outward so brightly, that it began to go from dazzling to blinding. Inuyasha held Kagome even as he felt himself changing, somehow lighter. The feeling was disorienting beyond all comparisons Inuyasha knew, he couldn't hear the others now, and his sense of smell was fading as though this were the night of the new moon. The rosy lavender color had finally bled away into white. Inuyasha was now sure that his feet were no longer on solid ground, they tingled as though he were in the air, falling or flying for all he could piece together.

Kagome was gone from his arms, though he was hardly sure he had arms anymore at all. And as the feeling finally did return to him, he was amazed by what his reawakening eyes were now seeing. His mother was smiling at him; beautiful and aristocratic, but still so warm and kind. To her left there stood the unmistakable figure of Sesshomaru, his great and terrible brother who looked a little bored. And more stunning still was the distinctly male figure, dressed in armor that gleamed with ancient beauty and a fierceness that was undeniably that which a Youkai lord would wear. He turned to face Inuyasha as though he were a mirror to both him and his brother. Ancient, and yet still in possession of the beauty a Youkai can maintain despite any age, his father looked into his eyes, stern yet gentle. He smiled.

The strange, nameless girl with the kind eyes, long black hair, and silly kimono was little more then a faded memory now. It was like looking back upon a dream, which ebbs quickly upon waking. The fading image of her face touched him in a way that caused his cheeks to blush, but she was just a phantom of a midday nap and as he looked out over the sweeping panorama which was the western lands. His lands. She faded completely as all good dreams inevitably will, into the twilight of the waking world.

Look upon the twilight and see the craftings of the divine as day is pieced to its antithesis.

Look upon it as that which was day fades into that which is night and see if your eye can catch the threadings. Picture now all the more subtle unions which transpire in perfect anonymity.

Let your mortal eyes seek out the science within the sorcery and be delighted in each failure.

Few should be so cheated as to catch the magician in his reflection.

Prelude's end, the story's beginning.


	2. chapter 2

Disclaimer: I don't own the series, characters, or the rights. Well here is the second chapter, it was actually done ages ago, but my Grammatical gladiator of an editor refused to let me post until she was done giving it one last look through. (No faith in me at all) sadly she is only editor by night, during the day she is a mild mannered and insanely overworked college student. I think she just has more ambition then me. So yeah, hopefully you remember what happened in the last chapter.

Well here is where the alternate universe part kicks in. I apologize for the blog of backstory, but this fic is more about the history then a lot of others and you do need it to set the stage a bit. Hope you enjoy it, and fear not, the next chapter is done too, it is getting edited now so it hopefully won't be too freakishly long.

Let me know what you think at: 

**Twilight of the Shadowed past**

**part 2**

By Logan

Edited by Stephanie (the yellow dart) Gonzalez

The darkness had passed.

Or so it was said from every land, province, and territory within the kingdoms of youkai.

Every great house had suffered under the long and bitter wars; every family had lain to rest a son or daughter who had perished in the last seven generations of fighting. There had come such celebration when the last house of man fell into the flames of its own forging. But a new issue had arisen that had never before needed considering: What to do now with the tiny, short lived race which had so nearly overthrown all the houses?

In the beginning, man and youkai lived together in uneasy peace. Man, a primitive creature with abundant hair and savagery that was befitting only the lowest of youkai, did change over the centuries. Where once he had been little more then a balding primate, man had come to wear a form similar to the highest class of youkai, notably less hairy, lean of build, and most troubling of all, clever. Man had evolved into a thinking beast who soon began creating crude cities from what once was dense forest.

From the very moment that man began making his own territory, there was blood on his mind. Man warred against his kin, and rallied together to war against the youkai they had once worshiped as pagan spirits. War against the youkai was a laughable thing in those days. Man would throw spears of wood and stone, and lash with rock knives that later evolved to steel ones as they began smelting steel from the earth. A single youkai of no great breeding was more than a match for hundreds of humans, and thus the first war ended.

Youkai--ageless creatures--seldom fought the same war twice, remembering all too well previous campaigns and their outcomes; man (which died off and passed the torch to the next generation) proved to be not so patient. The nations of man--for their numbers exploded with every new year- -banded together and organized themselves against their youkai foes. With swords and armor they fought, only to be defeated and sent back to nurse their wounds.

As the sun rose and fell over the ages, so too did the battles continue between youkai and man. Their futile efforts continued to be a topic of humor among the youkai lords, but even as they were defeated, the wars were proving something: man was thinking of things the youkai had not.

Around the fourth Great War, man began using incendiary devices which flared and exploded, shot metal fragments outward, and poisoned. This was dealt with simply, but the cleverness of mankind was becoming a thing of some talk; their magics were nothing more than simple mixings of minerals and resins, things youkai could have thought of with ease, but had not.

The fifth war involved curious projectiles that erupted into the sky and rained down upon the youkai in great explosions. Though only the weakest died in these attacks, they laid considerable waste to many great youkai structures. Man was stomped back into the earth with far greater ferocity. He was still an insect when compared to the great youkai lords, but by the seventh Great War--The Cry--no youkai laughed again at mankind's machinations.

The older ones still tell tales of the Great Cry which echoed throughout all the houses and all the lands. Man had come once again to make war against his old adversary, but this time he had claimed victory in the most horrific of battles. Man's new technology mimicked the natural abilities many youkai possessed, bolts of searing lightning, charring heat, strange beams which lashed and tore like the most horrific of gales... Humanity rode to war in great monolithic barges that hovered in the air as if they were dragons. They erupted from the sea like leviathans, laying waste to youkai ports. The army of man walked into battle with weapons capable of making them an equal to the youkai.

For the first time, the youkai houses knew fear from a creature that was not of their own kind

The battles were brutal and vicious with many dying on both sides. For years the wars raged until finally, and through much hardship, the youkai nation triumphed again. There was no laughter or celebration for the youkai houses now. Man had very nearly won, and the history of the wars told them that they would be back again in only a few generations, stronger than ever before. If man rose again, the houses would fall; the youkai would be destroyed. Efforts had to be made to permanently cripple mankind, lest it rise again and resume the production of its dark technology. Each land was left to accomplish this as they saw fit.

The Naga, a snake people who hated mankind deeply for man's murder of a single great youkai, eradicated every human in their land. Others mimicked the wolves' position and kept man as prey, and in some cases concubines. Most took humanity as slaves, breaking the human spirit from infancy onward, determined never to let the race rise again. All mankind's weapons were destroyed, his laboratories burned and buried. Though youkai did put mankind's ingenuity to work in their service, great watch was kept on it, lest it grow dangerous again. The wicked alchemy must never be rediscovered lest all the nations fall into chaos.

And so it was through all the kingdoms and houses that mankind's strength was either yoked or destroyed, but always broken. The last dying tribes fled, and The Cry ended at last.

It was during the last of the wars, among the Inu, that their great Lord bore his first son. The pup was cursed from birth with death on his hands, as it was his poison that murdered his mother while he was still in her womb. His father had extracted the pup, and took him before the great Shikon shrine where the oracle would name him, and with that name, whisper a prophesy as to what his rule might yield.

The pup was named Sesshomaru, and the people wept upon hearing it for it meant the destruction of life's circle should this child come to rule. For nineteen years the Inu prayed for their lord to take a new wife and sire a new pup who might someday take the throne.

Their prayers were answered.

The lord of the western lands did indeed take a second bride, but much to the horror of his people, he took a human as his mate. And from their union she bore a half-blooded pup who held little esteem in the eyes of the people. If their first heir, a full-blooded youkai had proved himself to be named after a curse, what could they expect from such tainted blood? But still the kind father, their lord, took his family to the shrine of the Shikon oracle, the most sacred ground in all the kingdoms.

A large and ancient tree towering over all others in the forest surrounding it crowned the shrine. It's ancient roots had come to cradle the small shrine of stone which lead downward into a burrow of sorts that caverned outward into a dense catacomb that bulged and sloped with the tree's massive network of roots. At the very core of a colossal hollow, the roots curved upwards and formed a kind of shrine to a tiny gray stone which lay embedded in what could either be the tree's wood, or pale stone.

It was ethereal down in this holy chamber, surrounded by the living roots of the great tree ancient even when youkai were young to this world. The chamber glowed faintly with hundreds of ivory candles perched and melted over the breaching roots enshrouding the chamber. No one knew who put the candles there, but in all the years that the Inu had acted as custodian to the shrine, no one had ever been seen changing the candles. It was almost as if they burned eternally, not subject to time as all things were. Flowers lay strewn along the floor of the stone and wood chamber as well, blooming like moonlight from the very floor, taking sustenance from the great tree itself.

The shrine held several ancient arcana from the shadowed past, but the legendary fang lay petrified to stone and entombed far deeper in the catacombs. The tree allowed some to venture down and look upon it, but not all. The god tree guarded its secrets well.

As the Inu lord walked down the hollowed passageways, his footfalls echoed down the halcyon corridor. He was carrying a squirming red bundle in the crook of his arm and followed closely by his human wife who walked hand in hand with his older son. Sesshomaru was tense as he walked down the sloping path.

"Mother, it is as though this place has eyes." The elegant woman turned down to him as he walked, squeezing his striped claw gently.

"I think it does, but don't be frightened Sesshomaru. I can feel great goodness here."

"Who said I was frightened? I merely made an observation," he replied smugly.

"Forgive me? I know you're very brave and also older then you look, but I'm still accustomed to thinking of you as a child. You look no older then sixteen compared to a human child." He snorted indifferently to her. Sesshomaru had adopted his stepmother slowly, but now had come to love her as the only mother he had ever known.

"I hope he gets a good name..."

"Would it matter to you if he didn't? Would you still protect him?" she smiled at him as he jerked his head to her shocked.

"Of course! He's one of our pack; a brother. I was just saying that I hope he gets a good name, one that will be honorable. Not like mine." She ran her long fingers through his mane of long snowy hair, and even though he fought the urge to swoon at her caress, he did nudge her hand subtly.

"Silence, both of you. They're coming."

Taking his place beside the altar, Sesshomaru lead his mother to his father's side, taking position himself and trying to look regal and intimidating as the Taijiya lead the people in. The tarijin at the head of the procession wore a mustard yellow plate over the black skins which covered nearly his entire body. He carried a long pole that terminated in a sweeping glaive made of centipede exoskeleton. He was flanked by eight additional Taijiya, who walked alongside a long procession of Inu, and then began directing them to take position within the great cavern.

In thirteen minutes they had organized a hundred and thirty Inu into the chamber, and kept additional subjects in line as they looked down on their lord from the various alcoves that looked down over the procession. The lord waited patiently until the captain of the Taijiya knelt before him and then informed him that they were ready. There were more of his forces outside the shrine, maintaining order over the rest of the subjects who waited to hear the name of the pup.

The crowds were chattering noisily with speculation and no more so than those who waited outside the shrine in the large mass of Inu. There were many human slaves there as well, dressed in robes similar to that of their masters, but among them it was not uncommon to come across a wolf youkai or a Neko. Many of the other kingdoms had sent subjects to hear the name of the pup. The Inu lands were massive, and their army fierce. Taijiya elite guards and legion upon legion of soldiers made the Inu one of the more formidable races of youkai. Should this pup receive a cursed name, it would be wise to know long before he took command of the Inu's forces. Better to know if an ally was prophesied a betrayer than to find out the hard way.

It was in the shadow of a blackened tree that one figure waited, his white fur pelt hanging over his face, rendering him nearly invisible in the commotion. He would only be seen as a trader or a wandering youkai, which was not uncommon and hardly worth notice. He slipped through the crowd now as he had for Sesshomaru's naming, and as he had for the naming of Sesshomaru's father, watchful of the one pup he was destined to kill lest that pup eventually kill him.

"I have bad feelings, Kar. With such tainted blood what can we expect for a name?" an Inu in gray remarked, giving Naraku pause as he slid through the crowd.

"Who doesn't have misgivings? He's only a half breed! But his father won't do right and kill him," his comrade, Kar, remarked sadly, "Our lord is too kind, he takes a son who is destined to destroy the world itself, should he take command, and keeps him under the very roof he, himself, sleeps under. A pup like that might very well kill him in his sleep to force succession. Now we've got this one, half human. He'll either be named for foolishness or weakness."

"The lord has made a life mate out of the human you know?" remarked a female to Naraku's right.

"Dark future ahead, I can only hope this half-bred fool will make a pup with a true youkai and then maybe there will be hope of salvaging the line. If the great Hanyou is kind, he'll let this runt take a mate before he's twenty!" The female laughed both bitterly and scandalously but Naraku was not sharing even half that much mirth.

The great Hanyou, their prophesied savior and almost deity. It would almost be amusing to Naraku that they were tossing around the word hanyou and condemning a half-blooded youkai in the same breath. The word hanyou was still a mystery to them, if they knew that it actually meant half blood, they would probably be cheering. Dread filled Naraku's veins with ice water as he waited for the runt to get a name, and thus either confirm or negate his misgivings.

Meanwhile, the lord of the Inu, unclothed the squirming pup from his red blankets leaving him bare and exposed as the congregation of Youkai and humans paused in appraisal of the tiny pup. He had white hair, as all true Inu did, but it was clear from his absent markings and softer form that he was not entirely one of their own. His father took the pup and walked over to the altar, placing the tiny infant upon the branches and stepping away.

The little pup squirmed noisily, turning its head and peering around itself as only a newborn youkai could do. The child was small and helpless, but already it had the wisping strands of snowy hair that was so common to his people. His pudgy little digits were faintly pointed in minuscule claws, and as he made a loud yip he revealed that his mouth did indeed contain tiny little Inu fangs. On top of his head he wore two little triangular canine ears, which shone with the same fluffy white as his hair, a unique feature even among the Inu.

In the hushed quiet that followed, no one noticed two hooded Neko who silently took position at the back of the crowd. The figures wore folded cloaks of matted brown suede with white silk lining. Clearly of impeccable craftsmanship, there hung a wispy cowl over the other, wrapped over their brown cloaks like cloth spun from shadow. The only thing that gave them away was their glowing feline eyes that stared with great intensity at the wriggling puppy.

The branches surrounding the altar shifted slightly, and the tiny gray stone glowed faintly pink. The cavern itself seemed to grow brighter and no one part more so then the altar where the tiny infant squirmed. The stone was the pinnacle of what came to be seen as a long flowing system of roots in the very stone itself; alabaster pale next to the darker gray stone. Each tributary terminated at a medallion-like marker inscribed with a name written in strange glyph. Down and down the trail branched, terminating in some medallions, and growing farther down in others. In some it split into several rivers, in others it died altogether, but down the floor it went, the great tree of the Inu royal house which dated back to ages before the Inu were aware; back to the ages when all youkai were little more than what now is called carrion youkai, scavenging and hunting in filth.

The jewel glowed brightly in one flash, all it's light rushing from the orb and down the wall, following the line which all lords of the Inu lands took parentage from. The glow moved on the line with all the speed of a serpent, but a nearly clairvoyant perception of the one true path, snaking back and forth through the line, but never diverging toward a line that broke. It suddenly shot downward toward where the pup lay squirming. The pup's mother gasped sharply, but found a reassuring hand from her mate on her shoulder. The rosy light converged on the child, flickering over him in stellar sweeping patterns for the instant it passed over him, then down it shot. Down the same track where it passed through the marker bearing his father's name. As it touched the marker it flared brightly. When the flash faded to nothing more then a splotchy series of stars in the eyes of all those who had watched it reach its end, there stood a new tributary beside the one which bore the name of Sesshomaru. The blank medallion sat there for a moment, but then with a sudden geyser of smoke and pink light, the name burned itself into the stone. They all watched in awed silence as each curve of the kanna burst to life with volcanic splendor. A symbol ended and a new one erupted in similar fashion, all watched in complete silence as the name was revealed in one final blast of mystical pyrokinesis.

The edges glowed with heat as wispy curls of steam rose from the etched engravings, and as all stared at the new marker, the jewel faded back to the alabaster gray. The lord knelt before his son's name, eyes wide and gleaming. He whispered the name as if he himself didn't believe it. The symbols were familiar ones and no work would be needed in translation, but still he trembled as he stared down on the smoldering marker, the name of his child as ordained by the radiant Shikon jewel. Voices that once had been loud with bitter speculation now fell silent as the name was spoken. The pup yipped loudly, wanting his mother. He was just a pup, but in the instant that the name was spoken, it was clear that many lives would be bound to this one tiny infant; and clear that many lives would end for him as well.

"...Inuyasha..."

****

* * *

Seven hundred and twenty-six years later

Kagome lay sprawled on the terra cotta tile roof of the shrine, basking in the sunshine with immense lethargy cultivated over a long winter. Mt. Hakurei was warm this time of year, and after such a bleak winter, Kagome could think of no place she would rather stretch out than on top of the roof, reveling in the sun. Her shrine robes were pulled so loose around the collar that it would surely be quite the scandal if anyone saw her.

"_Miko are not to look like loose women"_

Kagome had never met a 'loose woman,' but she had her share of scandal and that was really nothing too epic. The old woman would scowl, the men would talk, grandpa and mama might scold her, but really, by seventeen she was past caring about what everyone thought. So what if she wore her robes loose enough to catch a draft, so what if she blew off a few lessons and snuck out to go swim? It's not exactly like they'd kick her out of the village.

She peered over the edge of the roof and looked down over the village that she had looked over so many times before. Wood and stone buildings of simplistic design lay encompassed around the very shrine she herself now lay atop. The shrine was a place of worship, but also the school that trained the village warrior priestesses. For as long as Kagome could remember, her village had been defended by the miko. Powerful youkai were not common on the mountaintop, but in a world ruled by their kind, a strong defense was the only thing that kept the village surviving for the last forty years. One god youkai or a hundred carrion youkai, both would result in the exact same end: the village would be destroyed and the humans would be futureless. It was this understanding on the part of the villagers that kept this one structure so well adorned and maintained. While every other building in the village bore some trace of the elements, the shrine was beautiful.

The men were primarily out working--what fields there were to work--on top of a mountain with very limited topsoil and a great abundance of stone. Mt. Hakurei was abundant with water, but the little earth there was to plant with was a constant worry among the elders. The soil required constant fertilizing and had to be worked tirelessly if it would keep yielding food until the frost came. The men would be busy for almost the whole season.

She looked over in the directions of the rice paddies and grimaced. A young man was lugging a heap of human made fertilizer down the road toward the processing cavern. She was thankful that she wasn't close enough to smell it. Of course there was merit to both horticulture and sewage systems. If her people hadn't figured out how to use the carrion youkai to convert human waste into viable fertilizer for the crops, there would be no food during the winter, but it still smelled horrific.

She looked away from the heaping cart and back to the village, more precisely to the large wall of steel stone and wood stretching from one edge of the cliff to the other. Two miko would be up near the guard tower keeping a questionable lookout for danger. There was very little danger to be had; the only youkai who lived on the mountain were the wormlike carrion youkai, and at this time of the year they would be massed together in caves along the mountainside entangled in gigantic slithering orgies and egg laying. They were not likely to stop either activity unless someone bothered them, and with the elders putting bans on the various swimming ponds, springs, and lakes during their breeding season, that was unlikely. Kagome hated those worms; if they didn't have to crawl into every hole in the ground they could find to couple, she could be swimming right now.

Kagome wished that something a little bigger might come wandering by. If a boar youkai wandered too close then maybe she could go and kill it. As one of the most powerful miko in the village, she would be able to go outside the walls and enjoy a little freedom while she hunted it. Boredom was such a common occurrence during the days when the wall was up. The other girls who were either studying to be miko or already priestesses would be out purifying themselves in the nearby falls which were great for bathing, but too shallow to do anything else in. Kagome didn't purify herself this morning just as she didn't the mornings prior. Of all the miko in the village, she was the only prodigy who didn't require ceremony to maintain her powers. She smirked at how much that must irritate all the others. They had to work so hard for what the village rebel obtained so effortlessly.

Grandpa was giving a lesson on ofuda to ten young girls a floor lower; tomorrow they would be taking their ofudas and plastering them on the great wall, adding their charms to the countless others which made the wall lethal to youkai who strayed too close. Kagome rolled over with tedium and peered over to where an old woman was walking with her fifteen-year-old granddaughter.

The girl was familiar. Kagome had been finishing the last of her formal training in the miko arts when the girl was entering her last year of formal education. She was like so many other young miko; honored and proud to take on the role and full of piteous indifference to the indignities miko endured, as well as all the things they were giving up. It was in this way that she was so different from Kagome; Kagome was proud to be a miko, but she mourned the title as well. Miko were constantly purifying and training, always studying and always working, yet never living. Kagome loved life; she loved the sun on this roof and swimming in the lakes by the village. She loved being a miko too, but differently from the way that all the others did. To her, being a miko meant defending and protecting. It was a form of love for her people to her.

Loving the people as she did, she still was irritated by them; irritated that she seemed to be the only one who rebelled and questioned. Miko were not meant to be zealots, Kagome was sure of it. She was a powerful miko, and she was half sure that the reason for it was because her motives were different. Not that motives mattered. She was respected for her power, but ostracized for it as well. The girl before her was a little different; she actually laughed when Kagome tried to be funny, and she got glared at when she didn't stifle the giggle fast enough.

Kagome leaned over the edge and waved to the girl. The girl was a miko now; learned in all the incantations and rituals that the warrior priestesses required. She would still attend class among others her age, but the schedule and format were different of the young girls who now trained. The girl waved back with a stifled giggle at Kagome's hair that was completely obscuring her face with its mass as it hung down like a shawl. The old woman--which Kagome knew never really liked her--followed the girl's gaze up and met Kagome's smile with a bitter scowl.

"You act like a irresponsible boy, girl," she remarked as she adjusted her robes, bothered immensely by Kagome's lack of modesty.

"I do try, Kida. Boys have much more fun. No one raises a single hackle if they go off half naked. But I guess it's a very dire responsibility to go alternate digging in the dirt and trying to rob young miko of their virtues; I shouldn't tease." The woman stared aghast, though Kagome wasn't sure if it was the informal use of her name or her flippant response.

"Child of Kikyo! You are a disgrace to those robes. A miko who says such slanderous things about the men who supply the food you eat!"

"And try to peek at me as I bathe as well?" she replied smartly. "If any group in this village are children of Kikyo it would be them. They should respect the women who keep the youkai out of their fields, not try to mount them all the time." Kagome said with a certain edge to her voice. She'd gotten into her share of fights with certain amorous villagers who had known her since she was a girl. She had known several young apprentice miko who lost all their powers because the village boys couldn't take being cooped up so long. Beauty was a curse half the time, since most of the teenage miko in this village were too beguiling and weak willed to ever lay down the law if things got out of hand. Kagome was dreading the day when she would have to marry from such a group.

"You were named for the great mother, and you talk like that. I suspect from the way you behave that you're no stranger to such things." She began to walk off with the young girl in tow. Kagome called back to her.

"What does it matter what my mother named me? And what does it matter what a failed miko accuses me of?" As Kida winced and addressed her robes once more, Kagome regretted saying that. Kida had been one of those miko who allowed themselves to be ravished by young village men. She bore a son from him, but was never wed. She had lost all her powers and bore the shame as well, as much as the old hag was rude, she was also a thing to be pitied.

Kagome watched them walk off down the street, the girl turned and made a rude gesture to Kagome. What did that matter? Kagome had long ago accepted that she was to be isolated from the other miko of her age group by both the power she possessed and also the lack of maintenance it asked. Had she become cruel over the years? She said such a mean thing to that woman, and had never shown much respect to anyone. She was arrogant with her abilities, yet they continued to grow with each season. Soon she would be the most powerful miko in all the histories of her village, she could kill youkai with nothing more then her willed presence, an arrow from her bow could do far worse.

Kagome was named for the fabled great mother, Kagome, the woman who wished the world into existence from the shadowed past. Many thought that Kagome's mother had been too proud of her child, and that by giving such a name she would anger certain spirits that kept humanity humble. Seventeen years later, Kagome was living up to the name. People talked of her disobedience, her rudeness, her irresponsibility, but they also talked of her as though she were her legendary namesake reborn.

She caught sight of her brother as he shambled down the street, arms laden with scrolls and herbs that would be dried and then ground into ink for the ofudas. At thirteen, Souta was already looking to be a very desired man. Baby fat had given way to some muscle and a sharp and handsome face. His eyes were clear and piercing; seeing the spirits in ways even some miko could not. It was very rare for boys to have spiritual power, but Souta and Grandpa had both been exceptions. They were already talking about arranging a marriage for him; one with a noteworthy miko who could have children more adept with powers than if they were to make children with a farmer or a metalworker.

That bothered Kagome more then she let on. Her little sensitive brother was already having his bedroom affairs planned out. It was customary to wait until the late teens before marriage became an issue, but Kagome suspected they were going to try bending the rules with Souta since he was already on the verge of being able to make children himself. It was common knowledge that with so few humans passing through the mountain range, new blood was rare. Most marriages were between distant cousins, and with each generation it became more and more of a danger that inbreeding might be what eventually destroyed the village where youkai had not.

Souta and Kagome's father had been the exception. A traveling monk of the 'Bound Hand Order'-- as the villagers dubbed it--had happened upon their village on a pilgrimage. They took him in; a year later he married a young miko and unclothed his hand, renouncing his order. He remained faithful to their mother until sickness took him, but by then he had fathered two very gifted children.

It was probably due to their father's blood that both children proved to be so powerful, also why his son was growing up to be so handsome and smart. Mama often said Souta looked like his father and Kagome often winced as she said it. Mama never talked about the boy's marriage prospects, but if he was that powerful and that attractive, there was worse in store for him than being forced to chose a wife. He would be pressured to spread that new blood around to more than just one woman by the village men, and if he was attractive, the women wouldn't object. Kagome knew boys well enough to understand that many would be thrilled by the idea, but her brother was different. He was gentle and sweet, a crybaby with no desire to learn a weapon, and who would love his wife even if he were forced into the union. Souta would want to please the village, but he would suffer great anguish over being unfaithful.

That was the only upside to Kagome's marriage prospects. Though she would absolutely be required to have children, she wouldn't be pressured into whoring herself out to have different children from different men.

Trying to break herself from her depressing musings, she tossed a pebble at her brother who jumped in surprise at it flicked his ear. He stared up at Kagome and frowned.

"That wasn't nice, sis."

"Going to cry about it?" she remarked comically as she slipped down the roof and landed beside him, ruffling his hair. He smiled at her and she took some of the scrolls from his arms, helping him get a more comfortable grip on the herbs.

"I saw Kida and Tomea on the way over, they seemed angry when I said hello."

"They're moody women." she shrugged as they begin walking up the shrine steps.

"Tomea muttered something about offensive blood in that family." He lead off, looking pointedly at her as he was crossing over the main shrine and toward the storehouse. "Why do you have to be so mean to everyone, Kagome?" he continued.

"I suppose I just am tired of being fated to stay with these people until either I die or they die. We haven't heard from another free human village in years. I'm starting to think we may never see another new face again." They deposited the supplies in the storage bins and left the shrine, intending to go take a walk and chat.

"I don't think there are any free villages left, they all are youkai slaves now. Or dead." he replied sadly. It was a fear that was growing more and more momentum with each season without word. As each passing traveler confirmed for them again and again that they had not come across a single human settlement, the dread was becoming a tangible thing, and though no one spoke it outright anymore, they all feared that they were the last.

Together, brother and sister walked down the winding street, feeling the heat upon their shoulders and in their hair, discussing things far more trivial the farther they went. Souta had spent all morning assisting with the ofudas, one of the most dull things that Grandpa ever asked him, since all that really meant was passing out the inks and scrolls. They came to rest by a fruit-bearing tree. The tiny morsels were not yet ready to eat, but the shade was inviting and Souta very nearly collapsed under its curving bow.

"Hojo asked about you again. He seems nice." Kagome looked over at the young boy with a somber expression. Hojo was the apprentice metal crafter for the village, a kind but boring boy.

"He'd be better off with Eri."

"Why don't you like him?" Souta pressed, he was worried that Kagome's lack of enthusiasm could get her forced into a marriage with someone who was worse.

"You worry about things too much." she remarked, but continued before he could ask. "Hojo is nice, but he's settled. Do you ever listen to them talking about what we should do here? The old men talk about fortification even though it's been eight years since anything more powerful then a mantis youkai approached. The young men talk about expanding our territories and taking on more farmland. It seems like everyone has their own ideas on our future, but have you heard what Hojo says?" Souta shook his head.

"Nothing. He has no opinions over our future at all. I want a man who has a mind of his own, not just a mentality to follow whoever makes the rules. I can't love someone with such a weak mind." Souta hugged her suddenly and fiercely. She recovered from her surprise and stroked his hair.

"I'm worried over you, Kagome. I think you're setting yourself up for sadness."

"Sadness isn't important, Souta. I'm a miko. I will survive anything regardless of if it's difficult or not."

"Maybe they'll just stop trying to care about whatever incest rules they have left and let us marry. I promise I'll boss you around all the time, sis." he grinned deviously and tried to tickle her. She pinned his hands easily.

"You're such a sick little boy, I think I should forget about youkai and start trying to purify that mouth of yours instead." She started to tickle him as he giggled insanely, but both froze as the shrill clanging of the bells rang out through the village. Kagome instinctively looked over to the wall and saw the distant figure of a miko slamming a hammer into the metal gong that acted as their alarm. They heard shrill cries as the village women ran for their homes; the men would be running down the hill from the farmlands.

Kagome was to her feet in an instant, and Souta needed no encouragement as both siblings began running down the panicked street toward the shrine. Kagome's bow was in her room; she couldn't join the other miko until she had it.

As they tore down the stone laden road they already saw the miko taking position on the wall, double lines of bow carrying women in identical robes stood in tight formation, looking off at whatever had caused the alarm. Kagome skidded to a halt before two women who were peering through a large gap in the monolithic wall. She grabbed one of the women by the shoulder and spun her around.

"What is it!? What's out there!?"

"Dammit girl! You're a miko! Get on the wall!"

"What's out there!?" The second woman turned to her.

"Youkai, a hundred carrion youkai. They're all hanging back behind two. One is an Oni, the biggest I've seen, and the other is what looks like a man on a horse. He's wearing white pelts. Now get up there! They're about to let the first volley fly!"

Kagome broke back into a run for the shrine and her weapon. This was bad. Carrion youkai wouldn't behave like that unless they were forced to by a bigger youkai, and the Oni are dangerous youkai. Perhaps the most dangerous sign however was the fact that Kagome couldn't sense anything outside the barriers. A youkai with a human form and the ability to mask his Jaki was proof that he was much higher then any of the other youkai they had come across in many generations. Youkai that looked human were some of the most dangerous youkai out there.

A miko let out a cry of horror and Kagome and Souta turned back to the wall just in time to see the body of the young man who had been carrying the cart of fertilizer out to the cavern come crashing down mere feet ahead of them. The limp and blackened corpse was skinned and hit the stone pavement with a wet sound followed by a snapping noise that was his spine. Souta screamed and Kagome drew him back to her. The corpse landed so that it was staring at them with a gaping and torn mouth and two clouded eyes. Kagome could sense the faintest traces of miasma on the flesh. The skin had been melted off.

"But Kagome! The barrier! How could they throw that in here if the barrier were up!" Kagome didn't answer, but pulled Souta tighter. The first sign of alarm should cause the miko to cast up their holy barriers around the village. This youkai in white could break miko barriers.

"It's okay Souta!" Kagome called out to him even though he was just inches away from her face.

Kagome suddenly made a run for the wall. She had to see the youkai for herself. She came to the wooden gate all the miko stood upon and peered through a gap in the planks and steel. She saw the youkai in white instantly. He was sitting on a black horse that looked terrified by the creature atop it. Kagome could sympathize. The youkai was human looking, wrapped in snowy white furs and wearing baboon's head over his face. He was talking to the colossal Oni beside him, a purple and black monster with wiry white hair and two jagged horns. The Oni was impossibly proportioned with great spindly arms and small, squat, legs. It was eyeing the gate hungrily, but obviously waiting for the youkai in the pelt to give it leave to attack.

The miko were preparing to attack, but by the time the order to knock their bows was given, the one (who?) reached out toward them, tossing a handful of dust into the air. Kagome grabbed Souta and buried his face into her chest, trying to shield him from the rapidly expanding cloud of lavender dust. It spread quickly and descended upon the village, bathing everyone in a shimmering powder that proved to not be poison at all, much to Kagome's shock. She expected toxins from a youkai who had miasma, a very rare and lethal form of poison. The powder, however, was seemingly benign, completely devoid of ominous jaki.

The one in white nudged his Oni companion and motioned toward the wall. Kagome tried to scream out a warning as it hit her, but it was too late. The miko were given the order to fire.

As one, they let their arrows fly free, but instead of unleashing a volley of shimmering lavender bolts, there were explosions. The arrows and archers both burst into infernos of swirling flame the second the arrows were charged. Kagome screamed and flung herself over Souta as the ancient wall was compromised. Each miko was swallowed in white-hot fire and tore searing holes out of the alcove on the wall. Though the wood and steel had been fitted with hundreds of ofudas, it was still susceptible to something as simplistic as fire. A young miko fell several feet away from Kagome and Souta, a ball of flame that rolled on the floor for no more then a second, then grew still. There was so much screaming that Kagome and Souta were drowned out in their own, non- agony fueled cries.

A sudden impact struck the gate with a loud thunk and was followed by a slithering noise and the groaning of wood. Kagome grabbed her brother by the shoulder and heaved him up from his knees where he had been weeping and hauled him into an awkward run. They ran around the burning corpse of the one miko who was now black and wet amongst the flames. They ran along the wall, sprinting for the shrine.

A sudden crack signaled that something had broken through the gate, and not daring to look back, Kagome knew that the gates and barriers her people had spent generations erecting would all soon be falling. The youkai in white was different from all the youkai Kagome had ever learned about before. While many youkai were intelligent, this one was lethally so. It was a miko killer, if ever there were such a thing. This one in white had engineered a way to render barriers and walls ineffective; he had killed virtually all the miko in the village in one tragic moment. The village was on fire already; the air clogged with soot and smoldering tar smoke.

"Come on Souta! We have to get to mama and grandpa!" The shrine was in sight when Kagome heard the gate come crashing down to the ground. She didn't look back, but as a sudden howl of malicious glee lit through the air like a thunderclap, it became all to clear what had just happened. The one in the white pelt had set the Oni loose.

Kagome and Souta ran for the shrine, fueled by both adrenaline and terror as they heard the cries of their neighbors. The fire was spreading faster then Kagome thought possible; the houses had caught and soon the village would be cinders and ash.

An arrow flipped by the siblings and thunked into a door, the archer screamed. They exploded into the shrine and Kagome heaved the heavy doors closed with more strength then logic would dictate her muscles capable of. The doors were not Oni-proof, but the illusion of a barrier was almost as valuable as the real thing when you're as close to a heart attack as the siblings were by this point. For a frantic instant, both were silent and pressed against the door, listening to their ragged breathing and the distant noise from outside. They heard noise that could only be described as an avalanche of stone and steel crashing down as though it were pelted from the heavens.

"It's killing them..." Souta whispered.

His words were the jolt that broke Kagome from her horrified trance. She grabbed the boy by his shoulder and pulled him away from the door. She called out to her mother and grandfather, but before she was done they were already in the room, both with panicked eyes and pale complexions.

"Mama, the wall has been torn down! All the miko were killed!"

"We saw. Now quickly Kagome, pay attention. We don't have a lot of time before that Oni comes here. This is the biggest building in the village, he will think to come here soon," her mother said with a hurried tone while she busied herself going through one of the storage closets.

"The village is going to fall. That youkai in white knew how to kill the miko, and without the miko we're all dead."

"That's not possible, the village--" Souta trailed off.

"Mama, I'm a miko, I can fight."

"No, listen Kagome, there's nothing one miko can do. Don't use any of your power, I saw what happened when the other's tried.... the one in white knew how to stop miko energy." Her grandfather cut her mother off.

"The Oni is more powerful then anything we have read of in scrolls. He's attacking us like he knows our minds, like he knows what we are going to do before we do it. He's a devil, but he's not a god. He's not invincible, but he is more then enough to destroy the village. We've watched the Oni; he's killing every living person here, babies to the old. He's looking to exterminate every last life here, I doubt he will stop until everyone is dead." Her mother handed a satchel to Kagome and began filling it with dried meats and a jug of water before turning back to the storage closet to retrieve more.

"Head west. You will pass through a forest and then pass by the foot of a mountain. The mountain is wolf youkai land so you must be careful. Once you pass the mountains, you'll come to a forest with no carrion youkai. The forest is the edge of the Inu youkai kingdom." Kagome's heart froze. The wolves were ferocious, but the Inu youkai are the most fearsome of all the youkai breeds. Kagome could remember reading about them in the texts: pure white hair and golden eyes, fangs that can crush steel, claws that can slice through armor, little wonder they were so feared. There had been an ink illustration that showed all these proportions in great detail. They were beautiful but horrific creatures.

"The Inu youkai are feared even among the other youkai breeds, I don't know who sent these youkai, but they wouldn't pursue you through Inu land."

"But Grandpa..." Kagome hiccupped.

"You must pass through the Inu lands without being caught. Inu youkai are dangerous to other youkai; to people they are even worse. Keep going until you reach the sea, then look for rumors of human villages where you can go. Do you understand?" The old man asked, a tinge of panic in his voice as he kept looking back over to the door.

"But, you can't want me to go alone!?"

"Take Souta, and do exactly as I say!" Her mother had just finished cramming the last of the first aid supplies into the cloth satchel. She fastened the ties meticulously. Her eyes watered as she went to work on a second pack that she handed to Souta.

"You're coming though, right?" Souta whimpered.

"Here, Kagome. These are the only three we have, but they might help." Grandpa slipped Kagome a second pouch with three large painted gourds nested inside. Kagome recognized the red markings to be warnings. These crude explosives were used to break rock and uproot trees for the farmers when the obstacles were too imposing. Her grandfather made them, and she was well aware of how powerful they were. Souta was crying now as his mother fussed with his pack.

Kagome made for her room up the stairs; she wanted her bow and also something more formidable to wear then the miko robes. She wanted a jacket with thick material that could shield her from many of the small scratches and nicks that you get from traveling over open land. She also thought that she should get one for Souta. Her hands were trembling as she thought over the instructions and her brother's whimpered question.

Was she going alone?

The door lurched and cracked as something hammered into it. Kagome spun around and watched as the second impact tore its hinges. A large purple skinned claw was holding the pulpin remains of a villager he had used to crash through the door. The body fell from his open grip unceremOniously as the creature peered inward, his livid red eyes gleaming as he ripped the last of the door away.

Grandpa and momma grabbed Souta and scrambled back from the hulking Oni as it ducked in through the door. It was colossal and misproportioned, with oddly jointed limbs that hung nearly as long as his body was tall. Its hindquarters were small and thick with muscle. The creature's torso was immense and thick with musculature and odd indentation of bone. Vaguely reptilian, the Oni's head was set lower on his torso, giving him the impression of a humped back.

It entered on its hind legs, but soon dropped down to all fours, leering at the humans with its crocodilian mouth. It moved slowly and with a degree of anticipation as its minuscule tail swished back and forth. It looked at them as they hunkered back farther and farther away, gradually putting as much distance as possible.

"Naraku wants you humans dead, but one above all the others." Kagome gasped, she hadn't thought it capable of speech. It glanced at her and grinned.

"The others' minds pointed me here, and they were right. You might have lived a little longer if you had just ran away, but you came home. You kept thinking: 'I've got to get to mama and grandpa' and 'my bow is in my room, why didn't I have it with me?' and here you are. But don't try and go for the bow, that powder is still on you and I want to kill you, not watch you burn." The Oni reached up and took hold of one of the rafters in the ceiling, effortlessly pulling it, and part of the roof down atop both it and the doorway. It shook off the stone and wood easily, but the door was now inaccessible.

"How did it think to do that? It's just a big Oni! Oni are stupid, this isn't right." The creature mocked, peering down at Kagome's mother.

"Souta is just thinking about how everyone in the village is dead, how sad he is for them. You almost are looking forward to me eating you." He sneered.

"And the old man... he's thinking that I am somehow able to read minds, he's trying to figure out how he can kill me if I know what he's thinking. He's trying to figure out the best way to get out now that the door is gone. Oops, the Oni is hearing everything I think." Goshinki laughed.

"Why am I here?" he addressed Kagome's mother.

"Yes, why are you here?" The shrine maiden questioned darkly, summOning up all the courage she could against the terror that was welling up within her. The Oni moved forward, close enough so that the woman could smell the flesh on its breath.

"To kill the girl called Kagome." He turned for Kagome, but leapt away as her mother had just tossed an ofuda where he had been. The creature seemed very amused by their surprise at its speed.

"Kagome, take Souta and run as soon as you can." Grandpa replied as he began walking along the edge of the room, flanking the Oni. Mama had done the same, from the opposite side. The Oni looked very amused. Kagome inched over to where Souta was, hugging the wall with her every move, wary of the creature.

The purple behemoth made as if it were preparing to lunge for them, but spun around instead to face Grandpa, who was looking at it contemptuously, yet with an air of triumph. The creature looked confused, then leapt back towards the ruined door, this time peering at mama, though Kagome had no clue why. She grabbed Souta and started inching back towards the stairs.

"You're very dependent on that mind reading trick of yours. But if we send you flashes of images, how can you tell if the other really does have an arrow flying at your head or not. We have defended this village for many years, Oni, and we know you're not invincible." Grandpa replied as the Oni flinched again. It was obviously not enjoying this trick.

His reply was cold and malicious where as before it had possessed a degree of playfulness. "That's easily solved, all I have to do is kill one of you, then I can focus on the other." He suddenly launched himself at grandpa, seizing the old man in his claws and bringing him up to the wickedly lethal mouth. Kagome cried out as she suddenly seized her brother by the scruff of his neck and made for the stairs. The Oni flinched and turned to find Kagome's mother throwing a decorative lance from off the wall at it. It avoided the lance easily, but turned to find the old man lunging for its open jaws. He snapped down on the arm, severing it easily, but suddenly in agony along with the old man who was thrown to the floor with bone crushing force.

Kagome ran up the stairs, Souta screaming for his grandfather and protesting being pulled away. Kagome's heart tore in two when she watched his jaws close over grandpa's arms, but this was the only chance she and Souta had to escape. Her room was too far away, so she shot straight into Souta's, heaving the door shut and knowing that it was pointless to lock it, but faithful that any barrier between them would be well placed.

The Oni roared in agony, clutching his throat and shrieking curses. The old man had shoved an ofuda down the creature's throat. The tiny spell scroll burned like fire inside the Oni, who now crashed about the house in a frenzy of snapping jaws and slashing limbs. He stomped the old man and flailed for the woman, only to have a new ofuda thrown in his face, igniting on impact.

The scroll was quickly rent away, but already the flesh was bare and blistered. The ofuda had made mind reading impossible now; its searing energy was pulsing through the Oni, a constant tumultuous blaze of agony and flame that would prove too distracting when it came time to focus in on one mind's voice. He turned on the woman and seized the decorative lance from the ground, then hurled it into her and hissed with contempt as she glowered at him even as her heart fell still.

The children. He had to kill the children.

Naraku wanted Kagome dead!

He set off up the stairs, hobbling and crashing through the rafters, too disoriented to evade them now. His mind lubricated only by the thought of the girl's blood. Once Kagome was dead he would finish this nest of humans, and then Naraku would remove the ofuda from within him. His master was kind to those who served him most unquestiOningly, but not those who failed him. He would bring Naraku the flesh of this child foe, and prove himself to be the right hand of his lord.

Kagome unlatched the shuttered window, swinging the wooden doors open. Light pooled in across the floor in a slash of gold. The smell of burning flesh and wood filled Kagome's lungs and she gagged and sputtered, but forced Souta through and onto the roof which she prayed was still as sturdy as it had been before the Oni had pulled down so many rafters.

Souta was through the window when she heard the sound of the creature ascending the stairs, making wild animal noises and randomly striking walls. She wished for her bow, but less than she wished her skin would remain attached. She dove through the window and scrambled along the roof, redoubling her effort as she heard the Oni punch through the door and wall without the slightest effort at trying it for a lock.

Thankfully, Souta had already started his dismount down the drainage pipe, which caught the rain and siphoned it away. He scuttled down it like a little monkey with his sister very nearly on top of him by the end. Kagome heard the Oni on the roof now; it was having trouble with the tiles that had easily supported the siblings, but broke loose in sheets under the weight of a creature a massive as that which now tried to run across the roof. It was out of site, on the adjoining roof, but that would hardly be enough distance to keep them alive.

Souta hit the ground feet first from a little higher then he should, Kagome jumped from higher than he and winced as the shockwaves of a very solid ground rattled up her legs and into her pelvis. Souta was looking at their house with a kind of lament that was gentle and tender, but at this moment very near suicide. Kagome shoved him hard and he stumbled in the direction of the nearest house. They would use the houses for cover, hoping that the Oni wouldn't be sure of the direction they fled since he wouldn't be able to see them. They heard him fall off the roof, obviously a victim of the tile. He cursed in a tongue far more primitive then any Kagome had ever heard, but took little joy for him being hurt by his topple from the roof. A fall from that height wouldn't be enough to kill him, and he was now on the same level as they.

She lead them in a run down the alleyways, careful to always be flanked in the shadows of the houses still standing. She heard the Oni as he shuffled along the houses too, not quite on their trail, but close enough to pick it up if they were announced. Kagome tried not to let Souta stay still long enough, ducked under the awning of one of the simplistic homes. The ground was littered in the dead and she needed him as mobile as he was able if they were to survive this. The shade of a single level building turned from warm to ice as they heard paused to get their baring and heard the deep panting breath of the thing they had been fleeing. It was on the wall right next to them, if it turned the corner they would be feet apart.

Souta's eyes widened as he heard the breath flowing from the reptilian nostrils like gusts of sulfur from the nostrils of a volcano. The breath whistled faintly as the creature shifted on his hind legs slightly, knocking over a vase, which splintered to ceramic fragments on the ground. Kagome seized Souta by the shoulders and held him immobile. If he tried to run now, they would be heard. It wasn't running at the instantaneous speed it had demonstrated back in the shrine, but she didn't want to engage it in a footrace.

Its mind reading must not be working now, for Kagome's mind was screaming in panic as she heard the knife-like claws scraping at the brick and mortar nervously. It hissed low in its throat and dropped down to all fours, further upsetting the fragments of the vase. It began sniffing the air.

Just as Kagome was steeling herself to run the opposite direction and risk the open pursuit that she knew she had no chance of, the Oni tore off in a gallop southward, the sound of its footfalls growing more and more distant. Kagome pulled Souta forward with more force than she thought possible, since the boy was horrified of running through the open street. Sadly, there was no choice about it; the street separated them from the last row of houses that bordered the now shambled great wall. The Oni had seen people fleeing in the south, probably mistaking them for the siblings. They had bought this moment with the lives of those people.

Souta ran lamely with his hand viced in Kagome's. His legs were stiff and awkward, but the will he had was augmented by his sister's grip, assuring that if he fell now, he would be dragged to cover across the bare stone. They passed the road without hearing a howl or screech to signal the Oni had seen them and now giving chase. They made it to the shade of the house, but Kagome denied Souta the chance to stop there. The people that the Oni had seen now screamed in agony, and were silenced. The creature was looking for them again.

The wall was on fire, and would need to be transgressed safely. Once that obstacle was overcome, there were two possibilities laid out for them beyond the burning remains of that which once had given their people a sense of safety:

There was a long stretch of open country that would facilitate a breakneck run with little chance of stumbling or falling. Once this area had been a farmable area, but erosion had made it a difficult field to maintain. Every time the winter snows melted, they would wash away much of the precious soil, thus fences had once been constructed to hold back the precious earth. These fences needed maintenance and had to be restored when there was still snow on the ground. They were more trouble then they were worth, so they were abandoned for the fields nestled between the two cliffs and defended by the great wall. Soil had been taken in mass from this open field, what they couldn't manage had been washed away except for certain spots where the geography held onto a little of the soil. Those spots were now bustling with tall grass that Kagome and Souta could duck into if hiding became a priority.

The second option was the more difficult rocky road. They would first have to ascend a ten-foot cliff of pure rock. This was a lot easier than it sounded since all the kids in the village knew how to find footings at certain places; this was the most direct route to the swimming ponds, lakes, and falls. From there it would be a matter of working your way through low hanging tunnels and sharp turns along a winding cliffy road. Running top speed would be impossible, but for a creature as big as the Oni, it would be either a matter of circling around the long way and risk losing them at an obscure turn off, or crashing and squeezing through passages that were barely big enough to accommodate a human. If they had a chance, it would be here.

Kagome looked around at the wall of flaming wood, finding what she could use close by. She saw a broken off panel of four boards that had survived the fire as the wall had fallen. Kagome ran to it and dragged it to the flaming wall. Tossing it over the flames, she called out to Souta, who thankfully ran for it without excessive coaxing. The wood was already starting to catch fire as Kagome ran across it, flanked by fire on both sides. She was leading Souta over the mossy ground toward the stone wall when she heard a shriek of triumph. She didn't have to look over her shoulder to know that the Oni was coming for them.

The rocky ridge was steep but yet never so easily scaled as it was now. Souta, aware of the danger and somehow possessed by a will to live that transcended his natural will to grieve, scrambled up the crag as though he were more primate than man. Kagome followed suit, thanking god with every footfall that he was doing so well; she was dreading having to pull him up. Souta was staring behind her with pallid fear as Kagome made it to the top and grabbed him by the shoulder, grunting his name as she ran. Her ebony hair was plastered to her face with sweat as she ran for the nearest passage in the stone. The opening to the shallow tunnel was small, narrow and low; Kagome would have to crouch while running to make it in.

The Oni thundered behind them as it leapt eight feet from a gallop and careened with the rock face above the shallow ridge. He landed on all fours, embedding himself into the stone. Kagome sprinted the remainder of the distance, taking her brother under both arms and throwing him into the opening. Rolling, he hit stone and cried out with pain. With a sudden snarl of her own, Kagome leapt for the hole, feeling claws graze her ankle as she passed. She struck the ground and rolled, yelping as her shoulder smacked into the eerie geography of the dry cavern. Souta had scrambled away from the opening, but now had inched forward to pull his sister by the leg away from the entrance. The Oni crashed into the entryway; his colossal form far too immense to be facilitated. He hissed and snarled as one colossal arm delved in after them snatching wildly into the abysmal dark. Kagome clutched her shoulder in agony as she scooted with Souta out of arms reach.

The boy was trembling fiercely and at a glance through her squeezed-shut eyes, Kagome found his face mottled with clumps of caked dirt and blood. He had hit his head when she threw him in, but a second longer would have had them both looking far worse. Souta had released her and now cradled himself in a niche on the rock face. The tunnel wasn't very massive, but it was sufficiently long, and sculpted from the pass itself. The Oni wouldn't be able to slip around to the other side easily.

"S-Souta? Are you alright?" she winced as she tested her arm. It wasn't broken, but it was agony to move. The boy said nothing, but did look at her. His dark eyes were terrified, but not the eyes of an animal scared out of his faculties. Kagome looked down at her ankle, blanching at the twin scratches. The Oni had come so close that dumb luck was the only reason Kagome now had a foot at the end of her leg.

The Oni snarled and raged as it clawed at the ground. There were words she could identify to be her own native language, but so muddled with hisses and roars that they were veritable noise now. It took back its claw, apparently resigned to not catching them like that. Instead it peered in from the opening, it's great read eye full of radiant hatred.

"You're going to die, children. I am going to meet you on the other side, then you will die." He looked at Souta intently. "I am going to peel the meat off you while you're still alive enough to feel it. The last thing you'll remember is the feeling of me eating you piece by piece." Souta's trembling seemed enough confirmation that the Oni was believed intrinsically. They watched as the great purple creature rose up onto its tiny hind limbs, listened as its claws ticked on stone.

And then there was silence.

"W-we're going to be okay, Souta. You know that. Remember what grandpa said, he's just powerful, he's not a god, he's not invincible. He can die, and we can beat him." The boy looked at her, his handsome and youthful complexion haunted. "Souta, believe in us," she urged desperately, taking him into her arms as though he were her child instead of her brother. She touched his blood soaked cheek, wincing at the abrasions. She kissed him softly on the face, whispering to him again and again that they would be all right, that they weren't going to die here. She found that with each promise she made, she believed it a little more. Souta was her child now, and she would defend him as though he had come from her own body.

She stared fiercely into him, feeling more a miko now than she ever had before, loving the boy as a mother and as a protector, especially as a protector. If she had to, she would die for him, and as she stared into him, into the boy's gentle and terrified eyes, she made that clear. She would defend him at any cost, for he was hers: a boy on the edge of manhood, but still the little brother.

"Believe in us, Souta." The Oni heaved a bolder against the entrance, sealing it in darkness.

"Believe, Souta," she whispered as he touched her hair tentatively. To her that was the best assurance he could have given.

Kagome lead him through the narrow passage and stooped upward as the familiar bend relinquished pooling light. The other end of the tunnel was stretched out before them. Sweet smelling air waited beyond, sunshine as well; was an Oni waiting for them there too?

Kagome lead him to the threshold, holding her breath as she did so. She came to pause before the passage, she was easily within grabbing distance now, but if the thing was waiting just outside there would be no way to see him until it was too late. She looked out through the opening, seeing the rocky path ahead, dusted periodically with spiky shoots of yellowish green grass. She made to pass through, but was pulled back by Souta. She looked down at him to find him terrified.

"What if he's out there?" he asked piteously.

"He isn't. I'd feel him." She wasn't sure if she could, she hadn't sensed him during their chase through the village, and he had been merely feet away from her then.

"He can't fit in here, Kagome. What if we just stay here, he couldn't get to us." He looked up to her intensely, afraid and yet willing to follow if she did press forward.

"We can't, he could seal us in. We'd suffocate or starve..."

What she was really afraid of would be that the big purple one would call the youkai in white. The youkai in the furs could fit in here, but somehow she suspected that he could do far worse then just inching into close quarters with them. She recognized a lethal danger in the Oni, but the second youkai sent chills through her.

"We've got to go Souta, I want to get as much distance from the lizard as possible." She lead him out into the sun, wincing as it passed over her in blinding light. She waited, yet nothing shot down on her. She felt the coolness of the air and the warmth of the sun, even the gentle flavor of the water in the air.

As her eyes finally readjusted to the brightness of day, she looked around to find that her hopes were founded. The Oni wasn't here, it would have a hard time guessing the right paths to lead around the tunnel, the mountain would be an obstacle to him for what Kagome hoped would be hours.

She began walking at a pace that was more manageable than the out and out run they had been managing since the wall came down. The path winded and forked away, yet having spent their whole childhoods playing among such passages it was no more a mystery than the layout of their own shrine.

The ground was even, carved into workable paths long before Kagome's birth. Many were in disrepair and most were uneven, yet there was a flat surface to facilitate travel with more success than if it were just open stone. They had put an entire cliff between them and the Oni, yet Kagome had no intention of dawdling away the head start they had won. She walked forward with a slight quickening of pace, ignoring the dull throb in her shoulder and trying to focus on the stone ledges and tiny plateaus which in some cases she had to duck to avoid.

"We'll never be back here." Souta remarked.

Kagome hadn't thought of that, they wouldn't ever be back. Souta had the luxury of being able to point these things out, but Kagome was leading and she knew that if she did take time to think on how she would never lay on these rocks again and let the water lap at her ankles she would cry until that thing was digesting her. She felt numb over the whole affair, orphaned and homeless, but if she did think too deeply on it she might as well as murdered to that list. She ignored him.

They were to go west, and continue on until they reached the ocean. They might not make it that far, but if they did, there would be only the faint chance of finding another human settlement. But either way they really would never be home. Kagome looked up at the cliffs that flanked the narrow little path. There were caves where the carrion youkai nested, some were occupied, others long deserted. She always wanted to explore them as a child to map out the hidden geographies of the dead-ending caves, delving and prodding the slick caverns where youkai hatched and incubated. She knew that she would never be allowed to do such a thing once she reached an age of understanding, but it never seemed more impossible than it did now. She would never climb these walls just as she would never know their secrets.

The lakes and pools were nestled along the path they now walked-she wanted to see them again-- but that was just a child's desire, nothing more than the will to see those caves to explore the forbidden areas. She was an adult now, and she had to take care for her brother and her own safety. The Oni must be escaped.

She looked back longingly to the cliff that jutted upward, a monolithic wall of much stronger metal than the wood and iron that had once protected their village. She let her eyes wash over it, but spun around in horror as she saw the Oni clutched to the wall like a gecko, descending slowly, but with an inhuman ease. It hadn't tried to go looking for the paths that lead around the cliff, it had gone over it.

She cried out to Souta to run, and the boy did with much gusto. His fear made an excellent fuel to his legs, and soon the two siblings were scrambling through brambles of dry wood and ducking under ledges. The path was irritatingly difficult to run through, but Kagome thanked every low hanging bridge of stone. Each would slow the youkai's pursuit, each would buy them time.

They were past the first pool of volcanically heated water by the time the Oni was on ground level. They were past the second by the time they caught sight of it again. It was galloping for them, leaping from rock to rock, but having a hard time with some of the tighter areas.

They ran for their lives.

The fourth was one of Kagome's favorite pools, and also the one that she was running for. The sprint had been matched only by the frenzied turning of Kagome's mind. A rabbit runs from a fox blindly, but a human can out think the fox. She was terrified, but she was also determined not to let herself lose the only solid edge she had. If she lost herself to her fear then they were just rabbits to this thing, and rabbits were nothing more then food to most things.

The fourth pool was reachable by a ledge. It was fed by a spring that bubbled up from inside the mountain itself. The falls fed into a large lake that was fathomlessly deep. The older children of the village would test their courage by jumping from the ledge and into the lake. It was a massive freefall that would put a lot of distance between them and the Oni. There was a trail that led away and out to the open plains waiting at the foot of the mountain. This trail was different from the one they were on now; it was smooth and easily traveled.

They made it to the ledge and Kagome panted as she spoke.

"Okay Souta, I want you to go first. Jump in and swim for the pass. Once you're there, run."

"Kagome?"

"Grandpa gave me some explosives. I am going to blow the opening closed so it can't follow. When the bombs go off there will be a lot of falling rock, the ledge will probably break off too. You need to be at a safe distance, I'm a faster swimmer then you." She smiled at him.

"I'll be able to catch up with you on the path, but don't go anything less than full speed. You slow me down when I have to stay with you. The farther you get before I can catch up, the better." Souta looked hurt by the idea that he was slowing her down.

"Go on, hurry now. I'll set the bombs." He nodded bravely and turned to the opening in the cliff. He had done this a hundred times with her when they swam together. Kagome watched as the boy leapt clear of the ledge, taking a perfect dive form, and plummeting down for what seemed like forever until he met the water in a great splash. Kagome smiled brightly as he looked up at her and began to obediently swim for the shore. That would be the last time she ever saw him, she knew. If she had told him her plan, he wouldn't have left her willingly. She wanted to yell 'goodbye' but calling out to him would only make him dawdle and inevitably begin to weep.

Kagome looked away from the boy and began setting the gourds into the natural crevices along the edge of the opening. She hoped to bring down as much rock as possible. If the Oni was able to climb a cliff like he had, it was clear that this little detour wouldn't slow him for long. But she found hope in the knowledge that this creature was pure predator; it knew which of the two siblings was favored to better escape its jaws. Kagome was faster, cleverer. He would want to kill her before going back for the little boy.

It growled at her from around the bend in the path where it now had come to stand. Kagome cursed under her breath as she reached into her bag and produced an heirloom to the Higurashi family. It was a remnant from the days of the great wars, back when humanity invented and worked with magical technologies. This tiny bauble was worth a house among certain traders. She knelt, oblivious to the Oni who was now leisurely advancing, sure of its ability to be on her in a moment if she tried to flee. She clicked the trigger and thanked all the good spirits for the reliability of the relic. The flint clicked together and breathed life into the tiny spout that drank from a reservoir of flammable resin. The jet of yellow flame had the three wicks burning in a moment. The fuses were not long, and as soon as the bombs were preparing, she began to act.

There was a slight over-dramatization to her backing away in horror, facing the Oni, but keeping an eye on the tiny embers of flame, which traveled smokelessly down the wicks, and to the gourds. The Oni advanced after her with leisurely steps, arrogant in a way that identified it as male as clearly as if she spotted the specific organs which this creature apparently kept internally. Kagome suddenly threw herself onto the ground and rolled behind a bolder, hoping that it would offer her some shielding.

The Oni realized the danger only a moment later as the bombs exploded with jarring force, tearing the cliff face down upon the gap, and serendipitously, the Oni as well.

The dust blinded while the tiny shards of falling stone pricked like biting insects at the back of Kagome's neck and along her calves. She clutched herself tightly; taking great effort in shielding herself from the possibly crippling stones that might fall atop her if fate seemed set on it. The last thing she had seen was the purple Oni taking a bolder to the chest. The impact had toppled the creature, and Kagome was sure that it was only one of several such collisions since he had been standing right at the spot she had aimed the deluge of stone for.

The echoing crack of the bombs began to fade to a low ringing in her ears and she stopped feeling the tiny pelting of pebbles. She opened her eyes and stared with amazement; the cliffs had fallen in ways she hadn't expected possible. The opening was buried by tons of rock and as the mountain wind shifted the last swirling cloud of dust, she saw that the Oni was partially buried under several boulders, which would have made pulp out of a human.

The creature hissed piteously as it shifted lightly. Not dead, but not having fun, it was apparent that the Oni would be in bad shape when it resumed the chase. Kagome got to her wobbly feet and began running again, aware of the sounds of the creature trying to shift some of the rock off of it's legs. She wondered if it was hurting as much as she? Her shoulder was pulsing with pain, her legs ached, and she was becoming aware of a stitch in her side, but then again, she hadn't been crushed under a few tons of stone.

She smelled something in the air that made her guts twist a little with nausea, the oily stink of dead meat and the lacquered pulsing egg sacks of the carrion youkai who nested among the caves that Kagome now passed. In the past, after the creatures had abandoned their dens, Kagome and Souta had gone exploring, looking at the remains of the slimy and coccineus egg sacks from which the wormlike creatures had hatched. The creatures were breeding and laying in this time of the year, and would be in a kind of trance. Both acts would be so completely consuming, that the youkai would fail to feed and the weaker would often die there amongst their eggs. The others would couple on top of the remains, laying their eggs over the fermenting cadavers, and when their larval young hatched, they would consume the festered bits of flesh.

They were only a danger to Kagome if she threatened one. They would be blind to any trespasser, awakening from their hazes only if they caught the scent of their own blood. When Kagome was nine there had been a boy who slipped out of the village to go and swim, he had stumbled into a nest and accidentally crushed an egg. They had found his remains several months later, encrusted with remnants of a nest and the markings of gnawing carrion youkai all over his black skeleton. The adults had loved to tell that story; it reinforced every rule they had.

Kagome came to a halt as a roar echoed through the cavernous pass. The Oni was close and there was little chance of a run saving her. The next section of the pass would be big enough to let him follow without impedance. She didn't have enough distance to make it to the next area that could slow him down.

She heard him coming, quick and fueled by wrath in its most primal distillation. She backed up against the wall. She heard the churning and clicking that were notably inhuman. To her left was a cave, and from the noise, it was occupied. The opening was too big to keep the Oni out, all that it would be was a dead end filled with lots of things that would clean her carcass after the Oni finished rending it into pieces. Still, the smells might mask her scent. Perhaps the Oni would pass, and she could slip back out the opposite direction.

The cave was cool and dark, dripping with moisture and reeking with the excrement and nesting fluids. She walked with great care to her footing, for if she crushed even one egg, she would be dead before the Oni made it to her. She could only imagine what kind of disappointment that would be to him, having invested so much time, yet robbed of that satisfying crunch. She saw the slithering mass cling to the far wall and ceiling. Forty at least, possibly more, and all were engaged in one giant slithering youkai orgy. The carrion youkai were grub-like, pale and slithering; large black pincers pulsed as they mated, as though each were chewing whatever thing had died and left this smell.

Her stomach churned in nausea and she looked to the wall closest to her. The wall was encrusted with brittle structures of solidified mucous excretions on the part of the females. The structure looked like a fungus, but was actually comprised of thousands of pear-sized eggs, nestled and undulating in a manner that seemed reminiscent of the slithering spectacle several feet away.

"Hiding in a hole?" the Oni hissed, drawing her attention to the entrance where it waited, a frightening combination of the golden sun, oily shadows, and scarlet eyes. Kagome slunk low, her knees in the slime runoff of the eggs. Her eyes widened suddenly and she turned to the slimy structure.

She gently took one of the pulsing things in her hands, rocking it back and forth, trying to unfetter it without causing the amniotic fluid to spill, invoking a most painful death when it did. The Oni was entering, slowly and with a notable limp. The rocks had hurt him, but not enough.

Back and forth, back and forth, then side to side. She worked with a greater sense of time, breathing through her mouth, as the eggs smelled worse then the sludge on the ground. The Oni was almost in striking distance when the egg came loose in her hand, intact. The tiny larva was wriggling gently inside its womb of lacquered filth.

"Your corpse shall belong to Naraku, Kago-" She chucked the egg into his jaws, which reflexively snapped shut over it. The Oni gagged and sputtered at the taste, but halted as dozens of carrion youkai launched themselves from the back wall at it. Kagome barely had time to drop to her stomach when they blind-sided the Oni in mass. They bit and tore at his throat, stomach, legs, and face. Each hissing and chattering with insect noise as it wound itself upon the massive creature. The Oni shrieked as it tore them away from itself. Dashing them against the stone walls of the cave. Stomping madly and slipping on the muck.

Kagome crawled on her belly along the edge of the cave, passing the raging Oni by feet, then bolting out of the cave and down the perilously unprotectable path. The Oni shrieked her name, tearing the things from his throat. Kagome had never pitied a youkai before, but she did feel a pang of something at what she had done, even though it was just to save her own life and not out of cruelty.

She had killed the infant youkai, and forced its parents to certain death against an Oni, and though they were both youkai and mindless, they were dying because of her. She focused only on the path ahead, rejoicing as she begin seeing more of the ledges and bridges of stone, shallow tunnels and other things which would slow her pursuer as soon as he finished killing off the worms.

Kagome was past the second hurtle when he came for her, stumbling in his gallops and looking much worse for wear. Carrion youkai were not venomous, but their jaws were thick with so much bacteria that they might as well be. Most humans who were bitten died; the survivors usually lost a lot of flesh near the bite. She couldn't count on the numerous wounds killing the Oni, but they were obviously making his chase difficult. Kagome caught sight of him from the corner of her eye as she climbed over a ledge of shell, her shoulder exploding with pain.

The Oni was torn and gashed all over his chest and throat, two carrion youkai were still latched on at the jaws to his throat and shoulder, clinging and dead. His skin was peeled back over his shoulder, leaving the pink and dangling musculature open to the air and raw.

He definitely was going to be quite displeased with her after this was done.

She was three ledges and two drop-offs ahead of him when he crashed headlong into the first stone bridge, which crumbled under the impact. He hammered his claws through the second, howling in agony as the sharp stone cut him. He slipped and lost his footing under the following drop-off, then crawled under the next ledge. Kagome was moving much faster than he under these circumstances, and soon caught sight of the large and gaping opening to an open cave eroded notably over the centuries. It was massive and pierced by light at the breached roof.

She ran up the short path, which lead to the cathedral of weathered rock. There was no defense here; it was open from all angles and would accommodate the Oni if he were twice as big as he actually was. Kagome ran to the far opening, panicking and jumping back as she stared down at the massive drop-off which awaited her had she run headlong through. It was a deceiving pitfall that would have sent her plummeting several stories onto a bed of sharp rock.

She panicked at the idea of a dead end, but caught sight of a small ledge four feet below the path's end. She could hop down and land safely if the ledge was sturdy enough. The Oni snarled with victory as it leapt over the last obstacle and broke into a gallop for her, its tongue lolling out of its mouth with an almost canine impression. It was tattered and bruised, but still willing to pursue, and with good reason. She wouldn't be able to out run him on the narrow cliff; he would have her in two strides.

Desperate times called for insane measures. She faced him, taking up position in front of the opening, careful to put her heels right at the precipice. The Oni was running madly, jaws open and gaping with dozens of hooked reptilian fangs. His remaining eye was murderous as he shrieked one final cry, entering the cavern at a frantic pace. Kagome stared at him, stared at the jaws. This was the destroyer of her village, the murderer of her family. He leapt for her, flying through the air with outstretched claws and a gaping maw of razorblades.

Kagome stepped backward and fell.

Landing on the thankfully solid ledge, she ducked as the Oni flew past her, hitting the crumbled remains of the path that had appeared whole from inside the cavern. He yelped in shock and pain then tumbled down. Kagome watching with every prayer she knew on her tongue. The creature rolled twice in the air, shrieking, then hit the ground.

He had landed on his back, colliding with a vertical rock formation that snapped his spine in an echoing crack. The stone split through his chest and stomach, spilling blood and organ out of the creature's now twisted form. It lay there twitching and limp as Kagome slowly walked down the ramping ledge, coming to stop right in front of the Oni. Its face was torn and shredded, burned by the ofuda, and now moving soundlessly.

It looked at her upside-down through its good eye. The jaws moved and broken teeth clicked against each other as it tried to form words, but failed. One of its horns had shattered in the impact and that which had once been so terrifying now looked at her with something primal and familiar: fear. Kagome wasn't sure what it was so afraid of as it looked at her; it either feared her, or it feared death. She suspected the latter given the kind of existence it had led. It was in unspeakable pain, dying in front of its murderer in a graveyard of parched stone. Kagome felt no pity for the thing, but she also felt the hatred dying away within her. With each shallow and wet intake of air, she came to see it with more and more detachment. It was like looking on a dying animal, not a sentient creature. For a fragile moment she wished that she were dying with it.

Its whistling breath grew silent and his gaze fixed with the milky stillness of death. Kagome had maintained strength through that last moment when he had looked at her and she back down at him. But now that he was dead and no longer able to see his destroyer, she slumped to the stone ground and wept with both grief and exhaustion.

* * *

****

The walk down the mountain was uneventful and full of some of the most bitter introspection Kagome had ever known. She walked, aware that each footstep would never be retraced, aware that home was gone and that her destiny was out there, beyond the mountain pass and the flanking grasslands. The thought of the western lands made her heart heavy in her chest. She had always hated these mountains because they were a veritable prison to a teenage girl, but they were home, and now they were being forever abandoned. She would go west and try to live, as painful as the thought was.

Her mother and grandfather were dead. They were dead and abandoned, left to rot where the Oni let them fall. Kagome shuddered with almost tangible grief. The scavenger youkai, nesting along the mountain, would eventually creep into their village and then into their shrine. In a few years there would only be the faintest traces of the village that once had stood there. The winters were hard on the mountain. The wood would go first, stone would fall under a few heavy winter seasons. The shrine would be the last to go since it was the most carefully constructed, but in time the tiled roof would grow bare and the snow and wind would do their work on the holy altar.

There would be nothing left.

The western lands. The kingdom of the Inu youkai. Kagome thought back over old texts and long antiquated maps of the land. The Inu kingdom was massive. The city's name was unknown, but its dimensions were sketched out in some of the old scraps of parchment preserved within the shrine. The main city was monolithic when compared to the village Kagome had known, and unlike Kagome's village, the city was near the sea, nestled into a crescent shaped canyon, which long ago had thwarted several human attacks. There were supposedly dense forests surrounding the kingdom, and Kagome had hoped that she could keep to the dense wood and slip around the crown of the Inu kingdom.

She kicked a stone as she thought about the land destined to be her home. There would be more youkai in the area, more danger. She would have to be cautious if she were forced to settle near a kingdom. Kagome was prepared for such grim possibilities, but she had hope it wouldn't come to that. She would find a human land, another city, but one of humans. A village where she could be among her own kind and safe from the wicked creatures that destroyed her world. There would be a sea after passing the Inu lands. She had never seen the sea and was a little anxious to behold it. Maybe the humans lived on an island? Maybe she would take a boat to her new home. Her father was a monk of the Order of the Bound Hand, a human who could pass through youkai kingdoms with far less caution thanks to his Order's influence. He had probably seen the sea and ridden on many boats.

She tried to think of him, that mysterious face which she had never seen, but liked to imagine watching over her. The thought warmed her heart a little. He would have been a kind and wise man, and probably a lot like Souta since so many people who knew him had compared him to his son.

What little warmth the image of her father had generated froze over as she thought of her brother. Souta was beyond reach now. The path he could take would lead him west, but also down a much more traveled road. He would be caught if he traveled over the roads. She ached to be with him, her little brother, and now last family. She ached over the helplessness she now felt for him. How she wished that she could be with him, protecting him. She had saved him by tricking him like that, but she cheated them both of what little comfort they could give each other.

The grassy plains, which encompassed the mountain on three sides, were beautiful in the sunshine. Alive and moving with each breath of cool mountain air, shimmering like amber water on a lake. The grasses came up to Kagome's thigh; tiny grasshoppers jumped on her bare skin, and then fled away in a single bound. She listened and heard their tiny chirping. In the distance she could see the verdant green canopy of the forest. She would travel through these woods as far as possible, using them for cover and shelter.

The grasslands ebbed away into flat ground and she stared into the shadowy fathoms of the forest. The tree trunks were ashen gray and white, dappled with shade and blanketed in the spotty carpets of moss and earth. This forest was visible from the mountain, and it had always been a place of majestic beauty and ancient glamour to Kagome. Though young compared to the forests near the Inu kingdom, these trees were nonetheless markers in time.

She walked boldly into the forest.

She was a match for most youkai, even without a bow she would be enough to frighten them away. The only real anxiety over her situation took the form of the youkai in white fur.

The one the Oni had called Naraku.

That youkai was dangerous to the strongest and most heavily armed of miko, and he had come with a host of lower youkai, stupid but savage.

Naraku scared her so deeply and she didn't quite understand why. The fear she felt for him transcended the normal and healthy fears a human might have for a powerful youkai; she had been nearly petrified by him. The pelt of white fur and the dried flesh of a baboon's face, which looked more bluish gray than she would think normal. His image sent icy needles into her spine, prickling her hair and also teasing a vague sense of familiarity. She had never seen his like, but there was something familiar about him.

The forest made all the normal noises a forest supposedly would make at this time of day. There were the chittering sounds of insects hunting or looking for a mate. There were the familiar noises of birds at roost. She sensed no Jaki of his magnitude in the air, so Naraku couldn't be here in this forest with her. The dappled shadow and random beams of golden sunshine washed over her as she made her way through, sensing the air with what she would just a day ago called paranoia.

Part way through the woods, she came to what appeared to have once been a camp. There was a long dead fire, now partially buried with leaves. She poked around further and found that the only other relics were the tattered remains of a discarded sleeping mat and a walking stick that could have been easily overlooked. She took the quarterstaff and noted that it was not actually wood, but bone. Bone crafted and carved to a perfect shoot of ivory, twisting at its crest in knotting design. The craftsmanship was stunning, but the sheer size of the bone that had supplied its material was troublingly apparent. A youkai staff made of youkai bone.

She tossed the relic aside, grasping for the first time that this had not been a human camp, but instead a youkai one. It was unnerving to think there had been youkai so close to home that went unnoticed. She had always thought the ones which made things like the staff would have been much farther from the mountain. Survival might argue that keeping the staff was wise: youkai bone was hard as metal and several times lighter, but she made no effort to take up the relic. These woods had sheltered many things before Kagome walked amongst them, and now they seemed sinister.

* * *

****

For four days Kagome had walked. By the third, her food was gone and she had been forced to begin seeking out what food the forest could offer. Without a weapon, there was little hope of meat and so the edible herbs and roots became a staple. This diet would not sustain her long, and the farther she went into the darkened depths of this forest the more obvious it became that the woods were changing.

In the beginning of her journey, she had caught sight of youkai lurking in her wake, sensing prey, but also sensing danger each time Kagome became aware of them and let her presence swell. These youkai were lowly, scavengers and stalkers, and as such ruled by primal fear. They felt Kagome's power, and they fled it. But now they were gone.

The forest did have all the old sounds and signs of animal life, but the youkai were gone. Not even a whisper of jaki rippled through the trees. Even up on the mountain she had sensed the low pulse of carrion youkai, but now it was vacant of all such lower life. She had read of such things in the old texts.

The powerful kill off the weak.

As she came to a clearing, the realization was made plain. The human mapmakers called the mountain Daken. It borrowed a word of the ancient language, a word that no one understood. Perhaps it meant majestic or vast or sinister; Kagome could only guess. She knew more of the language of the shadowed past then many, but that was at best a handful of words to which Daken was not included.

The mountain was sloped as though it were actually a great hill, but then erupted upward with a large projection of granite, speckled with large barren trees on one side. The mountain was not as big as hers, but where as hers had been mostly stone, this one seemed more a marriage of plant life supporting topsoil and rock. The whole affair looked vaguely like a claw erupting from the earth. Daken was the home of the Wolf youkai. Though spread out, this was the front territory of their kin, and that meant that the forest Kagome now walked through was theirs. They had killed all the lesser youkai, as was the custom among their kind.

Kagome began walking again, this time much more alert and with much more effort put to masking her presence from a youkai who might notice a strange air from the forest. Wolf youkai were distant cousins to the Inu. Several thousand years ago one branched out from the other. Adapting and growing until they were different species. Wolf youkai were less attractive then their cousins, where most Inu were lithe and stunning with long white hair and delicate features, wolves were the veritable opposite. Strong features and thicker musculature. Their bodies were much thicker and chiseled. Wolf youkai had claws and fangs; their hair was bristly and black. She had even read that some of them were born with tails! But looks aside, they were cruel creatures. Humans were prey to them, either for flesh to eat or for their drive to mate. Both were ultimately the same since after satisfying their needs, they would kill and consume their partners. If it came down to either option, Kagome would try for the former as opposed to the latter.

Kagome went the longer way around the clearing, keeping in the shadows of the obscuring treetops. She thought back over the map, praying that in the years since its creation the territories had not shifted. The wolf youkai had a small section of the forest; their range was more a mountainous one. With luck she would be out of their territory in less than an hour. She didn't know how long she had been walking through their land before realizing that there was no lesser youkai; perhaps she was almost out now. The Inu forests were much more vast, and perhaps whatever youkai hunted them would be more spread out and less likely to cross her path.

She was in a slumped jog when she first heard the distant and bayful howl. The noise seemed as though it were echoing off from miles away, but it was soon joined with other howls from up on the mountain where a den must lay coiled within.

Kagome ran.

For ten minutes she made startling headway through the foliage and brush, halting only as a new howl sang out from somewhere ahead. The wolves had gotten around her, circled in. She made a few more steps forward before she saw the shadowy lupine figure among the trees. It was an actual wolf. Kagome had a moment of relief seeing the distant and yet unmistakable form of a four-legged predator as opposed to a two legged one. The relief was short lived, however, as it began advancing with slow and purposeful steps. Wolves were pack hunters; several others would flank this one. The beast was muddy brown with fierce yellow eyes. It kept its progress towards her apparent. It was keeping directly in front of the western expanse, meaning to drive her back. Drive her back to where the pack would most assuredly catch her from all sides. This was not a simple predator; this was a thinking creature, demonstrating a cunning that clearly showed a youkai mind. It was trying to keep her from advancing west, keep her from entering the western lands where the Inu alone reigned.

That could mean that she was close to the border. But close was very little when faced with creatures that could move as swiftly as these. If it were a minute run it would still most likely be too far away. Kagome looked around wearily. She couldn't allow herself to be pushed back. She tore a limb from a low hanging tree. The wood cracked under her full weight as she heaved it away. The club was hardly a bow or a blade, but a club would have to suffice. There was no hope in climbing a tree. All that would be doing is assuring that the pack would have time to settle in around her. Going back would be just as suicidal; walking into the open jaws of this mangy creature's pack.

Steeling herself as best she could, she ran at the creature, club held high and ready to smack down across its skull. The wolf seemed surprised to have prey behaving this way, but ultimately it favored its own strength to weather the stick's lash. It was youkai enough to have a youkai's arrogance. The club flared with a rose colored flash as it struck the wolf in his side. She dropped the club and hissed in pain as the wolf yelped and rolled across the grassy earth. Her palm singed with smoldering wisps of smoke.

The dust, which had rendered her village helpless, was still present, diluted by days of sweating and mopping against her clothes, but she had not been able to really bathe since the attack. This dust was formidable, days diluted and yet still it clung valiantly, igniting a little as miko energy passed through her hands into an object. The club was burning on the grass now, the wolf looking far worse. The creature's whole side had been crushed by the impact of the club, leaving it a whimpering and twitching spectacle.

Kagome ran, but didn't get far before a large impact sent her sprawling to her stomach. Another wolf had caught up to her. She felt tears in her eyes as she began scrambling for the cover of a large and ancient tree. She had come so close only to die now.

She made it to the tree as the wolf caught her by the cloth of her pant leg and began shaking her violently. She kicked madly at the thing's face, hearing it grunt with each impact. A particularly vicious blow to the eye forced the wolf to let go. Kagome spun around with her back to the tree, panting and smeared with dirt and sweat.

The wolf she had kicked was in front flanked by three others. They all shared the same ruddy brown coat as the one she had crippled. Their eyes were hauntingly enraged, staring at her with a malicious intent to kill and tear, to avenge their fallen and savage the flesh of his attacker.

Kagome watched as time slowed while the wolf jumped for her throat. Watched as he leapt into the air with lips pulled back into a wicked snarl of ivory fang and pink gum. She watched as death lunged down for her and took some solace in the fact that she would die facing death instead of fleeing it. It was in mid air when a ribbon of golden light flickered across the wolf, splitting him in half in an epically grotesque spectacle.

The fragmented canine fell to the earth in a wet and twitching spectacle. Kagome blinked as the tiny mist of blood speckled her cheeks. The radiant and vivisecting beams lashed out from the treetop again, this time taking out the remaining three wolves in a single moment, shredding them to bone flesh and fur of no distinguishable origin.

She looked up and saw him sitting there on a branch from the very tree she now rested against. He was looking down at her with golden eyes through a hood of silver hair. He was an Inu youkai.

The Inu looked no older then Kagome herself, still smooth faced and devoid of facial hair-- assuming Inu do grow beards. He was startlingly beautiful, ethereal in the way all youkai were, but not ghostly in his allure. He wore a red Haori with matching Hakama pants, both of some unknown fabric, which radiated redness as though it were of sewn flame and not of any plant or animal. His feet were bare and draped lazily over the branch.

Her rescuer flicked his claws delicately, cleaning them of whatever wolf blood might have still clung. Each finger terminated in a ferocious razorblade of a claw, hooked and formidable, then shrunk back to a more natural point and size. His hair was as long as Kagome's, trademark to his species, but his head crowned in a pair of fluffy dog-ears where all the images of Inu youkai before did not possess. He saw her eyes waver to his ears and he flattened them to his head, growling low. She regained eye contact, trembling with the intensity of his eyes. They were beautiful eyes, but just as fierce as the scrolls said.

The staring contest only ended as a voice snarled out at them from the direction of the mountain. The Inu shifted his gaze from her and to the two figures who now snarled up at him, surrounded by seven more of their lupine pack. These were true wolf youkai, almost human in appearance, betrayed only by the claws and dominant fangs. Neither of them had tails.

"Inu bastard! You killed our brothers!" the first of the two roared. He was a short male with gray hair striped with black. His lips were pulled back in a fearsome snarl. Kagome looked up and found that the Inu was not intimidated. He continued to gaze at the duo lazily.

The one that spoke wore maroon armor that didn't look like it was made for him. In fact it almost looked human in origin. The iron was piecemeal and mismatched at that. Primarily he was clad in wolf skins of the same brown as the wolves, which ran with them. Tiny braids of leather held his makeshift armor together.

The second of the two males would be bald if not for the curious Mohawk of gray, which ran in spikes up his cranium. He wore the same style of piecemeal armor, fur, and leather strippings with the addition of a piece of thick chain, which Kagome could not derive a single purpose for. He was making wolfish noises to his four legged cohorts, anxious and keening noise fluctuating between rage and anguish. The wolves mirrored his noises.

"Well say something!! Don't just look at us, you've stolen our prey and murdered our kin!" the noisy one cried out. Only now did the Inu seem inclined to respond. He indolently let himself fall from his branch. Landing closer to Kagome then she would prefer with considerable ease. "You're trespassing on Inu land. I would think that idiot Kouga would have thrashed the difference between wolf territory and Inu territory into your heads by now. This happens too damn often." his voice conveyed notable irritation with the wolves, but not a single shred of intimidation. Kagome glanced to the gory wolf carcasses and guessed why.

"Our prey ran here. And she didn't get far!" the mohawked one cried out. His fangs pulled back in what Kagome thought a difficult posture, given his speaking.

"Do you damn wolves even have fucking noses? These trees are not your territory. They are Inu territory. It doesn't fucking matter if she was a step into our lands, she's not yours anymore." The wolves snarled at him. The Inu youkai barked suddenly and their snarling quieted.

"You're thinking you can fuckin scare me away in my own forest? You're lucky I don't carve up another of your fleabags for that. This bitch smells of your forest, she's been in it long enough for you to have done god knows what to her a hundred times. It's not my fault that you're incompetent."

"Give her back now! We demand compensation for the brothers you've murdered."

"No. I owe you nothing and I certainly wouldn't reward you for trespassing."

"Filthy half-breed!" the first one snarled.

"You're one to talk, you're not full-blooded wolves. Judging by your scent, there is a little Inu blood in both of you. I seem to recall a traitorous female leaving our lands for yours. As I remember, she bred a few mutts." The Inu smiled, his fangs horrifically apparent to Kagome. "So shall I tell Kouga that it was Hakkaku and Ginta who were caught trespassing and poaching on Inu lands? Your kind are pretty fucking stupid, but at least Kouga realizes what kind of enemy the Inu could be. I doubt he would value your lives enough to start a war." Both of the two winced.

"Let's leave Ginta. We wouldn't want to deprive the pup a chance to live up to his lord's example."

"Excuse me?" the Inu replied dangerously.

"He said that your king is a disgrace to all youkai for taking a human whore as a mate. For siring pups like yo-" He was cut off as the Inu's hair bristled and his eyes changed from gold to black ellipses surrounded by pure red. He took on Inu youkai markings and seemed to grow a thousand times more terrifying. Both wolves blanched as the Inu raised his stiletto tipped claws at them.

"Wolves... should know their place. And they should know that if they ever insult my parents like that again, I will butcher them and string their insides along the border between our territories." He seemed to have difficulty forming the words.

One of the wolves trembled violently and whispered the name: Inuyasha. Then the pack fled. Kagome contemplated running too, but something told her that there wouldn't be a chance of getting three steps away from him. He didn't turn to face her looking like that, but instead let his fearsome transformation ebb away. He only looked back at her when he was back to being beautiful and clear of eye.

"You speak, human?" he asked.

"You're going to kill me?" she asked, trying to steady her voice as best as she was able.

"You are in Inu territory, and as such, are Inu property." Kagome felt her stomach fall out from her as the words registered. He continued. "You will be my slave."

"Like hell I will!" she yelled at him, finding her voice in such a way that startled both of them. The Inu looked positively stunned.

"I am Kagome Higurashi! I am not a slave, and I will not be a youkai's slut! You might as well kill me now or let me go. I'm not going to give you anything you want." He grabbed her by the arm, pulling her to him and smirking as she stared up at him defiantly.

"And what is it that you think I want?" She kicked him in the groin.

He winced with pain, but the result was nowhere near as staggering as she had expected or hoped. His brow twitched and he growled a little at her. He looked at her hands, taking in the burn damage.

"That hurt a lot, bitch."

"My name is Kagome, not bitch. Ka-Go-Me!" She bit his arm only to once again be disappointed. The sleeve of his haori was like woven steel, which gave under pressure but didn't break. The Inu cocked his head at her quizzically, his ears pivoting toward her.

"Are you always this friendly?" He grabbed her other hand as it attempted to slap his cheek. She shot him daggers as she begrudgingly released his arm from her now aching jaws.

"Your hands are pretty burned, Ka-Go-Me. How?" She scowled at him, resigned to the fact that he was pretty much impossible to hurt. He smirked boyishly and flipped her around while sitting so that he ended up with her wrapped in his legs on the ground, incapable of running or kicking. His weight seemed obviously moderated, just enough to let her know he was in control, but not too much to be painful. She was quite frankly stunned by the ease at which he maneuvered her into this position.

"Please resist the urge to try tearing my tongue out. You won't." He took her hand and forced it open with some degree of care as to not hurting her excessively. It was the first chance Kagome actually got to see her hands. Both were burned terribly on the palms and she winced to see the singed flesh. This, Inuyasha (as the wolf had called him) then proceeded to lower his face to her open left palm and start licking the wound. Her eyes shot open with revulsion and she tried to pull her hand away. It didn't budge in his grip and he continued lapping at the raw flesh and blood.

This was probably a prelude to biting. Any second he was going to tear a chunk of meat off her hand and swallow it in a single gulp as if he were a reptile. She felt dirty and violated as he continued to lick every inch of her screaming hand. The pain began to recede and she blanched at the idea of him working some youkai magic on her. Her hand would surely turn into a claw when he was done with it.

Most infuriating of all was the fact that it began to tingle and start feeling good under his tongue. Inu saliva must have some kind of numbing agent; she tried to list of the reasons for such a feature. It would probably aid in digestion. It would make the prey docile while he fed. It probably had some function in Inu youkai mating practices. She stopped with that one and tried not to focus on the trance like intensity of his expression a he licked and how it might very well be a prelude to mating instead of biting. He moved onto the right hand and Kagome examined her now wet hand. The bleeding had stopped and amazingly, the wound seemed much better in addition to its painlessness.

Twenty minutes later Kagome's hands were cleaner then they had ever been in her life, and also painless. Inuyasha rose up to his feet, taking her with him effortlessly.

"Every hour I plan to do that. If you don't fight it, there won't be any scarring. You're temperament is horrible enough without you being lame too." he replied nonchalantly as he lead her through the forest and to a small winding path. Three steps into it she tried to bolt for the treeline, only to have Inuyasha leap in front of her and grin.

For the first twenty minutes she had tried escaping him several times, each one was playfully defeated, much to her wrath. She was definitely starting to hate this Inuyasha and thinking that every Inu youkai must be a total monster if they share blood with him. She had learned a few things from their time together thought.

The wolves had called him Inuyasha, and though that might be either a title or an insult, she suspected it was a name. They had also called him a half-breed, and when he transformed, he had said that they were not to talk about his parents like that. The wolves had called his father a lord and his mother a human whore. It fit. Though she was not well schooled in the Inu youkai political system, she did recognize the significance of how they had talked about lords and kings, then how Inuyasha had defended his parents; Inuyasha was of royal blood.

_More like a royal pain in the ass_, Kagome decided, upon the foiling of her third escape attempt. In her life she had come to resent a lot of young males because they were prideful and arrogant little brats who were so sure of their own charms that they proceeded to hit on her relentlessly. Inuyasha left them all in the dust. Every single time she attempted to throw herself into a dead run down a narrow trail along the road, or slip away amongst the brush, he had managed to materialize right in front of her attempted escape rout.

"You are such a..." she growled suddenly as he managed to slip around her, interceding yet again. The bastard wasn't even giving her the chance to run, he was catching her before she tried. At least the damn Oni had the courtesy to chase!

"Such a what?"

"My vocabulary is nowhere near dirty enough to finish that sentence," she grumbled as he grinned. He had a very nice grin even though it was a strange one, slightly lopsided and punctuated with a protruding fang. Kagome scowled yet again at how he just had to be breathtaking.

"You know how I know when you are trying to run?" he offered.

"Excuse me?"

"You keep looking around from left to right. You're scanning the road for paths where you would be able to run and I wouldn't be able to jump after you. I can kinda guess where you're planning because you look at it for a while longer then normal, then try to throw me off by going back to looking around." He chuffed. "You bunch up your muscles when we're close. You might as well just tell me when you're planning to make a break for it." He was definitely more arrogant then the men of her village.

"You are an ass."

"I've been called worse."

"Limited vocabulary, remember?" She smiled wickedly at him. They continued walking and Kagome begrudgingly stopped trying to focus on some means of escape. She wouldn't be able to get the drop on him, and the more she thought about it, the more clear it was that it would be a mistake to try too hard now that he was expecting it. She would try again once the situation changed and he wasn't too ready to chase.

"So how is it that you killed the Oni?" he asked suddenly, catching her off her guard.

"Oni?" She was suddenly very afraid. How did he know about the Oni? What if he were in league with the youkai in white? She could be walking right into a bigger danger than she thought.

"You smell." he replied simply.

"How could I have killed an Oni? I'm just a human, right? I'm good for nothing but eating, serving, and serving whatever sick little needs you have. That's all humans are to your kind aren't they. Food and whores, right mutt?" He stopped and took her by the shoulder in a firm grip.

"Listen to me woman. I am not a stupid half-breed." For the first time, his eyes were mean when he looked into hers. She winced, but did not back down.

"My name is Inuyasha. I am the second born son of the lord of all the western lands. Don't think just because I am half blooded I am weak or stupid. I smell the Oni on you. I smell his death on you. Don't lie to me! And I don't eat human; I'm fucking half human! You're not my damn concubine either. I don't have to steal my women. Don't you dare accuse me of such dishonorable things! I'm not a demon!" he growled. Kagome stared in shock; she had actually wounded him.

"I don't believe you." she remarked quietly, watching as his eyes darkened on hers. She expected him to crush her shoulder or to savage her throat; he did neither. She watched as his piercing eyes lowered. His hand dropped from her shoulder as his ears drooped on his head of snowy hair.

"Come on." He started walking again and Kagome followed. She was stunned by the change in him, stunned that his arrogance could be shattered so easily. She wondered if she could run away now. He looked notably less willing to leap in front of her.

He was a youkai, probably ancient given the ease with which he had carved up those wolves and threatened their masters. He had claws on each finger, fangs in his mouth. He was an animal, but something about the way he was walking made her regret what she had said. He was her enemy, but he had not been a cruel enemy, whereas she had been.

"I lived in a human village. We've never had a youkai lording over us. We were free of your kind, free and happy. Then an Oni came and destroyed it." His ear craned around on his head, listening to her as she spoke without looking up from the path.

"The Oni killed everyone in my village. My brother and I escaped, but the Oni separated us. I don't know where he is and I'm scared that he's going to stumble into a youkai's den and get eaten. I killed the Oni by luck, but the youkai who sent him is still alive. I don't know what they wanted with our village, it didn't have anything. No good fields, nothing worth mining. We just lived free and didn't get involved. We should have been safe." she spoke softly, finding that the words flowed from her like water from a fount.

"The youkai you killed was named Goshinki. I recognize his stink. He was a child of Naraku." Inuyasha spoke the name and watched as she stiffened at its utterance.

"He wore white fur."

"A baboon pelt."

"So you know him? Is he a friend of yours?" she asked tentatively.

"Every youkai house knows that bastard's name. He's everyone's enemy, and has been for thousands of years." Kagome stared.

"Naraku is one of the oldest youkai, he's impossibly powerful and a real prick." Inuyasha scoffed. "He bided his time during the wars, let all the other youkai fight the humans. Then when the wars were over, he started taking our lands. He got a lot of them too. But all the houses joined together in an allied front against him. He may be strong, but the bastard wasn't able to fight all the houses at once. We pushed him back to his small little territory, and have managed to keep him there." Kagome tried to imagine all the youkai houses united against a single enemy. How powerful could this Naraku be if it took all the Daiyoukai and their houses to stop him?

"Like the Holy Wars?"

"Humans call the wars holy? That's sick."

"I call humans fighting against creatures who would have themselves seen as gods, holy, yes." she replied defiantly.

"I think you don't have a full grasp on what the wars really were about, Kagome. They were before my time, but my father fought in them. He wouldn't fight for an evil cause." Inuyasha replied simply.

"You don't think it's evil what all the youkai lords have done? How humans are slaves? You're half human, don't you think that it's wrong for your mother..."

"Don't. Just because a couple of flea-ridden idiots speak doesn't make it true. My mother is lady of all the western lands, not a whore.

"You want to paint one side of the wars evil? Look at what mankind has done in his victories. He slaughtered, he destroyed indiscriminately, and he marched into this forest and tore the sacred trees from their roots."

"It was war."

"Is war an excuse for evil? The humans called it holy, but their means proved that they, themselves, were wicked even if their cause wasn't. I didn't see the wars, I was a pup when The Cry ended, but the evidence suggests that whatever it was, it wasn't holy." Inuyasha didn't walk like a prince; he sure as hell didn't act like one. He was Inu, and thus ethereal, but he surprised her as he spoke. He was just as smart as he was strong.

"You said the sacred trees were uprooted?"

"When youkai die, their remains still possess their yuki. It fades over time, but for at least a month it's potent. My kind buries our dead here in this forest, and then plants a tree over them. The yuki frightens away all the predators and nourishes the tree. A sapling will grow at four times the normal speed if it is feeding off yuki." He reached over and touched a majestic gray tree, letting his fingers glide over the smooth bark.

Kagome paused beside him and touched the tree as well. It felt like any other tree tactually, but she came to recognize that it did indeed have a kind of yuki. The yuki felt different from all the other youkai's she had encountered, even different from the wisps of Inuyasha's own presence. She closed her eyes and felt the gentle breath of the forest against her skin. The birds made tiny animal noises overhead and the branches creaked with the wind.

The yuki was different; it was purified. She stepped away from the tree with her eyes wide. The trees were more then just alive; they were vibrating with youkai energy. Purified to the point that Kagome had barely been able to recognize it as a youkai's power at all. She looked over at Inuyasha to find that he was watching her.

"The yuki is preserved in the tree. It doesn't fade, but becomes a part or it, just like the physical remains get wound into the roots and become a part of that too. The dead can't talk to us, but they still exist. I can smell Inu youkai who died centuries before I was born." He scrunched his nose a little. Kagome could understand the sacred part now. Tearing down these trees would be desecrating graves. The humans wouldn't have known that though. They would have just seen trees, not monuments.

"Hey, it's time for me to clean your wounds again." He had already taken her down upon the grass by the time she realized what he meant. She struggled as he took her hand and began to lap. He growled and she loathly complied, once again experiencing the strangely pleasant sensation and hating herself for letting a youkai touch her.

* * *

****

"So then he charged; flew right over the edge and down onto some sharp rocks. He hit wrong and got his back broken then died." She shrugged as she walked. Inuyasha listened with rapt attention. He seemed very interested in how she had killed Goshinki; often probing for more detail when she tried to gloss over aspects. Kagome knew enough to leave out all the miko aspects; that would be all she needed. Inuyasha digested the account, scrunching up his face at moments in what Kagome hoped was not stringing together too many holes.

"Keh, you're pretty tough for a human bitch. Goshinki wasn't a lightweight."

"So tell me more about Naraku. Why would he want my village?"

"Bastard probably just needed the untainted land. Naraku lives and breathes miasma and shouki; it kills everything. You should see his territory; it's nothing but scorched earth and rivers of poison. A lot of Naraku's detachments can't survive with that much poison at first. He makes them strong, but he can't really birth an army and keep a barrier around each of them all the time. Maybe he was going to use your mountain as a place to keep his detachments, you did say it was isolated." Inuyasha reasoned.

"What's a detachment?" Kagome asked a little peevishly.

"It's what makes Naraku such a bitch to fight. He doesn't really have a species of origin; it's more like he's made of millions of other youkai. He can take some of those youkai out of himself, and then improve them. Naraku can give his detachments whatever powers he wants; it's not like he is limited to what naturally comes to one species of youkai, he can mix and match them up so that they're a bitch to fight."

"I hope he really grieves over Goshinki then. It would be like losing a son."

"Keh, I don't think that bastard works like that. He doesn't love anything; but I think he did favor Goshinki, he was one of his more trusted detachments." Inuyasha smirked a little with pride though Kagome couldn't even begin to understand how he was proud for anything she did.

"Let me go, Inuyasha." she said suddenly.

"You're mine, you can't." he replied slowly.

"I'm not going to be a slave. I'll kill you in your sleep if you let me." she threatened.

"Key word being 'let.' I won't go chasing you off a cliff."

"You're a bastard." She felt good hating him again, it was too easy to let herself be civil and forget that he was kidnapping her.

"Where would you go if I did let you run? In that direction," he motioned to the north, "You'll come across the thunder empire. Ryukotsusei isn't very nice to humans. You'll either be killed or polish weapons until you die of old age. He also is one of the youkai who condones humans as recreational slaves.

"Over there is the wolves, you know them already. Past them is the Mouchou. Abi and her mom are flesh eaters. You'll end up as a skeleton in a nest.

"To the southeast you'll meet the Naga most likely. They hate humans more then any other race, even Naraku. During The Cry, humans killed an ancient friend of the Naga, Totosai. The Naga kill any humans who are fool enough to pass their border.

"And if you pass the Inu lands you'll pass close to Koumori's territory. Bat youkai are broken into tribes. Some are fruit eaters and will ignore you if you don't piss them off. Some are blood eaters; they would come down in the night and take you. Past them is the ocean, and past that is the Neko's territory.

"Cat youkai are difficult to gauge, all I can verify of them is that there are no humans on their land." he shrugged arrogantly, grinning a little.

"There are of course a lot of rural lords out there, rat youkai, reptiles, a few others. You're not going to just walk right into a human kingdom."

"Are there any?" She regretted asking immediately, she knew he couldn't be trusted as honest, an also she sounded way too weak. He didn't respond, just paused.

"We're here."

"Kagome found herself standing atop a hill beside Inuyasha, her eyes widening at the spectacular vista.

Massive swaying crops moved like verdant seas. Other crops were golden, and others were of herbs and roots. In the distance she saw the dug paddocks, which had been filled with water and now grew rice. There was more field-land here then she had ever seen before, rich and yielding earth bearing up more food than her village would have needed in two seasons. There was an orchard of fruit-laden trees to the left; she saw youkai and their human slaves walking among the groves, picking and gathering what appeared to be juicy and golden citrus fruits.

The youkai wore the same brown tunic and pants as their human slaves, obviously a standard uniform for the dirty work of farming. No doubt as soon as they were done managing the slaves, they would slip back into the regal finery that she suspected all Inu youkai wore, while the slaves would return to their rags. The slaves were far away, but she saw no faint figure in the distance with a whip and no feeble and half dead human crawling across the dirt, fleeing his Inu master. At least they weren't being cruel; in fact, some of the Inu appeared to be working as well.

The air smelled sweet, the orchards were obviously blooming. There was a breeze, which tousled their hair; Kagome pushed the ebony from her eyes to continue her appraisal of the Inu kingdom. Past the farmland she saw houses of stone and wood, nestled against trees, and in some cases entangled within them. The dwellings were small and humble, obviously the homes of farmers. Each, however, was more luxurious than any of the homes in her village. She saw tiny gardens at the sides of several houses. There were several Inu walking among the houses. She suspected several were female, though given the look of the average Inu youkai distinguishing gender would be impossible at a distance. They wore various colors, some pale pearly whites and others stunning blues.

Animals grazed in distant paddocks, she recognized horses and oxen, but there were some creatures that obviously bore youkai origin. Her gaze traveled down the main road and noticed as the houses began to bunch closer and closer, doubling in height and growing more luxurious. The city was set on a hillside sloping upward. She saw banners arched and flapping in the wind. They looked red, but she suspected intricate design that she couldn't see from such a distance. A little higher up and the buildings changed from wood and stone to just stone. The entire kingdom was nestled against a massive cliff, and as they met it, they appeared to be carved from the cliff itself. These houses were breathtaking, carved with such ornate detail that Kagome actually wanted to go deeper into the Inu city just to stare up at them. But even these amazing structures were dwarfed in both the beauty and scope of what she recognized to be the Inu castle.

It looked like the shrine, but was carved from the mountainside, whereas the shrine had been laid brick by brick. Like the shrine, the castle had a slanted tile roof, which shone like the scales of a dragon in the midday light. Massive and ancient trees grew up around it in impossible size. The trees wrapped around the castle and grew right up into the cliff face. Leafy branches stretched out and shrouded parts in shade and foliage. The trees were alive and leant a new depth to the majesty of the Inu castle. In the distance a lone monolith of a tree spired upward from the forest. She somehow suspected that it was of great significance.

Inuyasha laid a clawed hand on her shoulder; she was too stunned by it all to brush the hand away.

"Welcome to my village, Kagome" he grinned.

To be continued...


End file.
